


Supreme Designer Verse

by L_awlietxoxx



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015), Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-20
Updated: 2018-09-25
Packaged: 2019-03-21 16:04:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 74,282
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13744464
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/L_awlietxoxx/pseuds/L_awlietxoxx
Summary: A while ago I wrote this Devil Wears Prada meets Reylo snippet: http://archiveofourown.org/works/13375356I swear, it was just supposed to be a funny one-and-done. Instead, the development of the relationship between Supreme Designer Kylo Ren and his personal assistant/life manager Rey kept consuming my mind almost all hours of the day. How did they meet? How did he hire her? How do they eventually become lovers? These are questions I, at least, needed an answer to. Then, I started writing. Things just spiraled out of control from there...The more I built up this AU, the more intensely I enjoyed it. This has been a few insanely self-indulgent weeks of writing that produced 20K+ words... but I hope a few other people might get a kick out of it too!So, here are four chapters from the joint exploits and developing affections of Supreme Designer Kylo and Rey his PA - who becomes indispensable not only to his fashion empire, but to his very being.





	1. The Beginning

Kylo had been dreading this show for months. An exhibition on Jakku, of all the backwards places? But he had checked and double-checked the numbers and found some truth to the publicity: Jakku’s smugglers and scavengers started trends all the neighboring planets seemed to pick up. Debut this season’s new series into Jakku’s elite, and it should spread to the whole star system within a year.

And so Kylo found himself, much to his own chagrin and distaste, … here. With just the short walk from his speeder into the congress hall, he managed to get a mouthful of sand, a coating of dust in his hair, and the trailing ends of his long, starry-night-shimmering black overcoat tangled between his knees. He was already surly and irritable upon entering the building.

A short line of event organizers stood ready to greet the Supreme Designer and his retinue. 

Bowing low enough to look at the ground rather than Kylo’s intimidating scowl, the foremost organizer said, “Welcome to Jakku. We are honored by your presence and participation in our gala this year, and we hope you will find preparations well underway to your satisfaction.”

“Doubtful,” was Kylo’s only reply, his gaze sweeping over the hall’s atrium impassively while he snapped the tails of his coat against his legs to banish the desert dust. He sighed in a severely put-upon manner. “If you would, send me the event director. That way I only have to deal with one of you people and you can sort out inefficiencies yourselves.”

The woman who had greeted him stiffened, straightening up quickly while her gaze darted towards the group standing behind her. There seemed to be a hint of fear in her expression – A perfectly familiar sight to Kylo, though one usually turned in his own direction.

“Inefficiencies?”

A moment later, the owner of the sharp voice revealed herself. 

The smallest of the group, Kylo had almost entirely missed her. (Though admittedly, he’d hardly given the welcoming party a thorough study.) Coming to the front, the slight young woman neither bowed nor averted her gaze from Kylo’s tall, dark form. Instead, her chin remained high and her strong gaze confronted Kylo with disdainful defiance.

Her greeting limited itself to simply, “Ren,” accompanied by the slightest tilt of her head. “I’m the director. I understand the trouble it took to travel here, and thank you for your time. Getting a bit of dust in your hair is a steep price indeed for the boost in sales and prominence our showcase has been known to offer.”

Kylo blinked, his expression stony as he processed the unexpected jab.

The small but relentless director went on, “We would appreciate your respectful cooperation with the final preparations. I would ask you to keep in mind that, to make room for your last-minute participation, we’ve had to cut several other designers who have showcased here for years. I regretted having to terminate those partnerships, but we will continue doing our utmost to accommodate your requests, no matter how inconsiderate or inconveniencing.”

Hux made a sputtering sound of disbelief from behind Kylo. As for Kylo himself, his expression failed to thaw save for a twitch around his left eye. After a few seconds of tense silence, Kylo asked with the hint of a wry smile, “What’s your name?”

“Rey. And I am – as you said – the only one of us you’ll have to deal with.” 

And with a quick, stiff mockery of a bow, Rey turned away and motioned to her staff. Within minutes, she had delegated the tasks of unloading the show wardrobes from Kylo’s ships, guiding the models he’d already hired to their dressing rooms, arranging how many further models would be required, and having Kylo’s technical teams brought to the control center to prepare sound and lighting. Stranded in the middle of an efficient flurry of activity, Kylo found himself in the unfamiliar situation of having nothing to do himself.

“Do call if you need anything,” Rey told him almost off-handedly, before being swept off by assistants with questions and papers for her to sign. 

Kylo watched her until she disappeared from sight around a corner, chewing the inside of his lip in desultory irritation.

 

Two hours before the show’s scheduled start, most of the lead designers congregated backstage for the customary trading of insincere compliments, veiled insults, and covert inquests into the aesthetic styles the others would be pushing. Nobody ever outright admitted they cared, but everyone sought reassurance their presentation would be ‘unique’. 

Kylo idled in a corner, mostly silent. In the days before he’d achieved the prominence and capital to hold his own solo shows, he had been forced to work with each of these other designers at one point or another. They were all beneath him.

He couldn’t suppress a slight shudder when he heard Snoke’s voice somewhere behind him. He didn’t turn to look. 

As little more than a boy, Kylo’s first job in the fashion industry had been a practically invisible assistant’s-assistant in Snoke’s design company. With equal indifference for hierarchy and the sensitivities of others, Kylo had almost immediately overstepped boundaries to propose design alterations and diversification. Those on his team loathed him; Higher-ups, intrigued and taken by his suggestions, swiftly promoted him. Within a single year, Kylo found himself at the drawing table with Snoke’s senior design team. But lacking any patience for social decorum or minced words, Kylo offended Snoke once too many times with criticism on proposed projects. Eventually, Snoke tired of the upstart’s lack of respect. But by that time, Kylo had already learned what had seemed the most important lesson of his life: The world of design was meant for him alone. 

Quite simply, he possessed the most innovative vision, the boldest ideas, and to realize them to their fullest, Kylo had to work alone. 

Another voice wove its way into the acoustics. Kylo looked up, and saw Rey across the room, accosted by designers with last-minute requests and assistants needing last-minute approvals. Making her way through the room, she dealt with each appeal and concern in controlled, clipped tones. By halfway through the room, she simply looked tired and over-strained. 

Kylo had heard everything he needed. Last-minuteness had always been anathema to him. As he expected, all the others’ design discussions lagged light years behind what Kylo planned to unveil. Whispers and scrambles to clear his way preceded him through the room. Rey did not look up with everyone else when he passed - Leaving Kylo with the novel, unusual feeling that he had noticed her first, while she remained indifferent.

Kylo swept out with perhaps more theatricality than necessary, chewing on inexplicable but unmistakable annoyance.

 

Kylo’s irritation flared when one of his assistants delivered the message that he was needed in the dressing rooms to handle a “wardrobe malfunction” thirty minutes before show time. His subordinates really seemed incapable of dealing with anything on their own, he thought in a bitter huff. What the hell did he pay them for?

Where he really wanted to be was at the back of the exhibition hall, surveying the stage set up and décor so he could give instructions regarding the proper lighting. But no – here he was, on the way to deal with some ripped seam or missing cuff link.

“Rey, no, you shouldn’t… We’re never supposed to touch the clothes. Some designers are so particular and I can only imagine what someone as famous as Kylo Ren would do if he knew…”

Rey cut her colleague off with a frustrated huff. 

“Look, I can handle this. We just need to keep things moving, and keep these bigheaded big names away from the details. Trust me, what Kylo Ren doesn’t know won’t kill him.”

His curiosity and amusement equally piqued, Kylo leaned into the dressing room’s entrance just enough to get a look inside without being seen himself. His gaze immediately landed on Rey kneeling beside one of his models. The model looked near tears as she held together the sides of her dress, where her shoulder had pulled a tear during the act of pulling on the diaphanous tangerine fabric. 

“It’s okay,” Rey soothed, smiling up at the other woman briefly while her fingers busily prepared a needle and thread. She held the thread between her teeth while she tied a quick, efficient knot at one end. 

Rey began stitching. But when the model looked down, she let out a gasp.

“Black thread? I-I’m sorry… I appreciate your help but Kylo will be furious when he sees…”

Rey hushed her just as quickly as the earlier protest. 

“I doubt he’ll even notice,” Rey replied breezily. “I’m stitching mostly inside, and the thread is thin. Besides, the dark color is a good accent, really.”

The model shook her head wildly. “Oh he most certainly, absolutely will notice. No one has an eye for detail like him.”

Kylo chose this strategic moment to make his entrance. Striding in with an unknowing, aloof air, he said to the room at large, “I was told something required my attention?”

His model gasped aloud, straightening up in terror. Every other assistant, makeup artist, and dresser in the room froze at the sight of him. Kylo’s eyes remained fixed on Rey, however, and he was rather stunned to see her actually roll her eyes to herself, not looking away from her final stitches.

“There was a slight problem with a seam but…” Rey leaned in to cut the thread with her teeth and deftly maneuvered the thread’s end from sight, leaving what Kylo had to admit was a flawlessly neat and straight line of stitching. Finally, she stood up and turned to him. 

“But you needn’t concern yourself with it. I have everything in hand.”

Kylo gave her a long, probing look before sauntering closer to inspect her repair. The model literally held her breath when Kylo’s eyes focused on the thread.

Kylo looked towards Rey with dangerously narrowed eyes. “Black thread? On an entirely tangerine dress.” His voice came out drier than the Jakku desert outside the exhibition hall – its incredulity sharp enough to cut glass.

Rey crossed her arms, holding her ground rather than cowering before his piercing stare like people usually did. 

“No one will notice. The dress fits properly again, and now she’s ready to go on. Besides…” Rey hesitated for just half a second, knowing full well she was about to step onto thin ice, but unable to resist when faced with his imperious, challenging stare. “I think the black is a good accent.”

Kylo just stared at her for a long moment, utterly off balance and without an inkling how to respond. 

No one had ever presumed to improve his work.

He managed only a stiff echo of disbelief: “A good. Accent.”

Anywhere else, speaking to anyone else, Kylo would probably have fired every single person in the room in one fell swoop. (Only perhaps a quarter of the staff in the room were technically his, but Kylo knew from experience that anyone who displeased him never kept a job for long.) He would have withdrawn his entire involvement from the event, storming out with enough scorn and fury to leave nothing but rubble in his wake. The gala would never regain its prestige.

Instead, locked in a staring contest of wills with this young director brimming with assurance and confidence far beyond her station, Kylo found himself unable to do anything but take her seriously.

He was left with begrudging respect for the small but immovable force of her.

Kylo had known plenty of scorn from the mouths of envious competitors, and the pens of fashion critics who lacked the intelligence or open-mindedness to understand his vision. But never before had he stared an irreverent challenger in the face. 

Kylo possessed at least enough social acumen to recognize the flint sparking in her eyes had nothing to do with clothes, really. Rey was set on proving something to him; On wrestling some of his complacent power from him. This had everything to do with the bored contempt he had displayed upon arrival. This was about him – Making the superior impassivity of his usual public persona only further validation for her resentment.

Eventually, once the edge of her challenging glare faded enough for him to feel like looking away wasn’t defeat, Kylo turned to study her repair again. He stepped back and laid a hand over his lips thoughtfully.

“Uncross your arms, Sara.” 

She still looked mostly terrified, but the model did as instructed. Kylo studied the hint of black thread, then the whole-body presentation. 

He couldn’t believe the traitorous, impossible thought forming in his own head.

“Give me a needle and more black thread,” he declared, not looking at Rey even while the directive clearly targeted her.

“I’m sorry?”

Kylo finally turned to look at her, just to demonstrate the seriousness of the request. The grim line of his mouth was set firm, entirely without any edge of mockery. Rey’s face was a mix of incredulity and rebellion at being ordered about.

“More black thread,” Kylo repeated without inflection – without giving anything away. 

A long moment later, Rey acquiesced with a sigh and laid the supplies in his outstretched hand. Kylo prepared the needle and knotted the thread in an expert blur of precision.

“You’re right,” was what he finally said, though his voice withheld any tone of capitulation and therefore any satisfaction on Rey’s part. “It is a good accent.”

He wet the thread between his lips before swiftly kneeling down at Sara’s other side. 

“But it needs to be symmetrical.”

Rey’s eyes almost bugged out of her head in surprise. Kylo kept his own head bent and his focus only on the quick modification – until Rey had to walk away shaking her head in disbelief but smiling slightly to herself all the same. 

As Kylo pulled the final stitches tight, he found a small, illogical smile pulling at his own lips.

 

Kylo watched from his private box as his Desert-Dweller line closed the show. Everything went so precisely according to plan – down to each lighting transitions and model cue – he couldn’t find a single thing to over-think or berate himself for not having done better. Yet in the back of his mind, a share of all satisfaction or accomplishment was commandeered away. Kylo had already known this line would be a success; but it was Rey’s meticulous management and precise direction that had made each of Kylo’s pieces truly shine like they were meant to.

Before the show’s end, Kylo had already left his box to begin giving instructions to pack up and depart as quickly as possible. He had no desire to hang about for the simpering press or the grudgingly fawning designers. 

Once the lights had risen again and the auditorium was beginning to empty, Kylo headed towards the dressing rooms to oversee departure preparations. Then, he planned to escape to his ship as quickly as possible. He didn’t spare a glance for the other designers lingering in the stage wings, but a cold, scaly voice proved impossible to ignore.

“… an insult and disgrace to the industry! You and your retinue just pander to Ren, like all the others. Only interested in showcasing the names that bring money, never true quality or creativity. This was a farce of a gala. Cutting my time short and removing five of my pieces without even the respect of notifying me… 

“Mr. Snoke! The adjustment in time allotments was necessary due to one of your models injuring herself backstage. There was no time to notify you.” Rey’s voice remained mostly even, betraying only flashes of defensive exasperation. “If I had tried to find you, your entire segment would have fallen behind and off time. I salvaged the remainder of your presentation as best I could…”

“Ha! ‘The best you can do.’ You useless, half-wit girl. If this is the best you can do here on Jakku, I’ll never be wasting my time here again.”

“Then she would count herself fortunate.” 

Kylo’s words cut across the whole wide room in an instant. They had sprung from some deep, reflexive source – before his brain had even acknowledged, much less approved them.

Snoke spun to face down the unmistakable voice of his long-past protégé, his eyes narrowing in distaste towards the young man who’d built an empire greater than Snoke could ever have dreamt. 

Rey looked towards Kylo in surprise, her features still lingering under guard.

Kylo’s eyes narrowed in pure frozen contempt as he stared down Snoke. “No one was here to see anything of yours. My name alone drew half the audience, if not more. Disabuse yourself of your illusions of importance, and stop harassing the director for doing her best to make your refuse pleasant to look at.”

Scandalized noises of shock sounded throughout the room. Snoke stood gaping for a long minute, unable even to muster a reply. Eventually, two of his assistants rushed forward in a futile attempt to cover up the utter mortification of the moment. They ushered him from the room before any further verbal blows could be exchanged. Kylo watched without flinching, the disdain in his eyes matched by some of the whispering voices spreading through the room. 

“How unprofessional…”  
“Snoke always was a nightmare to work with.”  
“Never that great to begin with…”

Once the room settled down again in Snoke’s absence, Kylo found his gaze automatically drawn back towards Rey. She stood alone in the center of the room, one arm crossed over her chest to grip her other arm. For the first time, she looked something less than completely confident. Kylo found it entirely the wrong look on her.

He followed whatever instinctive inner power had driven him to repel Snoke. It carried him across the room, to where Rey stood.

Like her scorn towards him had had nothing to do with clothes but everything to do with him – He found his defense of her had had little to do with Snoke but everything to do with her.

“Apologies that my behavior has cost you yet another designer’s participation.”

Rey stared at him blankly, uncomprehending for long enough that Kylo felt as if he were beginning to wither internally. He was the one who was supposed to make others feel self-conscious and embarrassed when speaking to him; What in the world had possessed him to say such a thing? Why the hell did he feel like the one with something to lose?

And then, just when Kylo was about to blow off the moment with some disparaging comment and storm off, Rey’s face split into a small yet luminescent smile. A small laugh bubbled out from her mouth, as she hurriedly rubbed the hint of wetness from the corner of one eye.

“You were right. I’m pretty sure we’re better off without that one.”

The pressure in Kylo’s chest relaxed at the sound of her voice. Rather than the hard and aggressive tones she’d serrated him with before, her voice was open and calm. Even bordering sweet. 

“Though that sort of thing happens more than you might think,” Rey continued. “We don’t garner much respect out here, no matter how hard or capably we work.”

“Why are you here – dealing with scum like him?” Kylo found himself asking, the words coming naturally and entirely bypassing the usual pit of over-thinking and second-guessing. “You should be on Naboo or Coruscant, at the industry’s top events.”

“You really think so?”

“I think I would enjoy them a lot more if I knew I could trust you to fix a seam.”

Kylo’s mouth opened with the intent of further speech, froze, then snapped abruptly shut. An outrageous idea had just occurred to him – Just as potentially disastrous as it was brilliant.

Rey had noticed the thunderstruck air about him, and was looking at him curiously. 

“Rey.” 

Taken aback by the sound of her name from his tongue, her expression grew somber to match the sudden gravity in his tone. 

“Would you consider working for me?”

Surprise poured over her in visible waves, her whole body straightening up as she processed the size of what he’d said in such small, easy words. But an instant later, anger rose in thunderous waves.

“I don’t want a job out of pity!”

“It’s not pity,” Kylo returned hastily, his voice firm but earnest. “I’m asking because this was the single most organized, well-run collaborative event I’ve ever exhibited at, and I want every one in the future to be this easy. If you could direct this event exhibiting eight different designers and pull it off perfectly, you could run my shows in eight different star systems. I’m asking because I have no patience for mismanagement, and I’m tired of constant headaches.”

Slowly, the defensive glower faded from Rey’s face. She spent a long moment taking Kylo in with calculated, searching appraisal. He could see her trying to decide whether this was yet another form of ridicule. 

“What would the job be exactly?” she asked cautiously.

“My personal assistant.” His words were running away from him – the idea taking shape so easily in his mind with hardly any effort. “Too much of my time is absorbed in logistics, details, and annoyances. I need someone capable as my intermediary, so every little thing doesn’t have to drain my patience.”

Rey had taken on more of a serious, thoughtful look now, but skepticism and hesitancy still visibly lingered in the way she held herself, drawn up and wary.

Kylo sunk his teeth into his bottom lip hard enough to draw blood. He couldn’t say why his heart was racing, or why he was debating his next words so carefully to ensure they were good enough.

“They’ll never respect you out here. To these second-rates, you’re nothing. But not to me.”

That physically rocked Rey an inch backwards, her final traces of distrust evaporating. Finally, she looked at him not as an adversary, but as someone she could, perhaps, believe in.

Rey cleared her throat, her gaze dropping down to the ground. She took one more moment to make sure she still reached the same decision, even when she wasn’t staring directly into the compelling intensity of Kylo’s eyes.

Rey straightened and confronted him again. 

“Alright. I’ll take the job. But you mark my words.” Every inch of her stern and convincing, she actually raised a finger towards him to punctuate her declaration, “The minute you stop treating me with respect is the minute I leave. I won’t work for a high-maintenance drama queen with a self-absorbed ego.”

Again, Kylo’s shock brought to mind the kind of raging fit he likely would have staged, should anyone else have dared speak to him that way. But instead, he found himself still standing there in front of Rey, calm as could be, with the hint of amusement playing over his face. 

“Is that truly your impression of me?”

Rey’s mouth scrunched and she looked away, as if realizing she might have gone a touch overboard. 

“We’ll have to give it some time to know for sure.”

“We?”

Kylo echoed her word choice, searching for confirmation. Rey paused for only the briefest of seconds before nodding her head with certainty.

“Yes. ‘We’.”

The corners of Kylo’s lips pushed up against gravity more easily than they had in ages. For the moment, he entirely forgot their usual heaviness; Along with that he usually carried in his chest.

“Well. _Sir_ ,” Rey enunciated the honorific with just enough sarcasm to draw a snicker from Kylo. “Let’s make sure all your wardrobes get properly loaded, shall we?”


	2. The Challenge

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey makes a stand. Kylo proves he can learn.

The air within a five-foot radius of Kylo practically quivered with fury.

“What you’re telling me is that every single blouse in yesterday’s shipments looked like this.”

His voice came out flat and entirely toneless. Then one of his hands slammed down on the table in the center of the room, where the repellant error was laid out for all to see.

Rey and the three women making up the Quality Control team jumped where they stood around the table.

Kylo fingered the blouse hem like he meant to spear it with his gloved finger.

“Every one with this uneven hem?! This is beyond unacceptable. This is a disgrace. MY name will be printed on hundreds of these mistakes, thanks to the utter incompetence of you three!”

One of the trembling women managed the courage to attempt a defense, “Sir, i-it was just the size of yesterday’s shipments… We were overwhelmed. Nothing like this will ever happen again.”

“Maybe I could believe that if I hadn’t been the one to catch the error!” Kylo snapped savagely. “Your laziness missed the error yesterday, and today your negligence failed to correct it. You’re certainly correct that nothing like this will ever happen again. I have a standard of impeccable quality to maintain that won’t be ruined by you fools anymore.”

“Kylo!” Rey hissed, glaring at him from narrowed eyes. But her protest was too late – the abused Quality Control team were already cowering before their oncoming fates, and Kylo was practically breathing smoke.

“I want you three off my ship within the hour. Forget about references. Not even the lowest designers would hire people who can’t spot a crooked hem!”

Instantly, the three began scrambling to dig their IDs and keys from their pockets and abandon them on the table. One had started crying a little, but the other two just looked desperate to escape.

Beside them, Rey looked positively thunderous. 

“No. Wait.” 

The unequivocal tone of command in her voice made every other person in the room freeze and turn to her. Rey wasn’t looking at the three disgraced ex-employees. Instead, every ounce of her ire and fierce disappointment fixed only on Kylo. 

It wasn’t enough to defuse the destructive rage pulling his shoulders taut and balling his hands into fists, but the fiery reproach in her eyes did rob his own glare of its edge.

“Kylo. Think about what you’re doing.” With controlled precision, she embodied a firm voice of rationality, knowing full well how Kylo would rankle in response to gentleness he would only hear as belittling.

“These three have been your Quality Control team for years and this is the first time they missed a small mistake. We all understand that the First Order’s brand carries a quality standard that must be maintained – but you also must know that in the long run, this will have no bearing on your name. By next week, anyone who may have noticed this hem will be raving about next week’s deliveries. You will suffer nothing from this.

“But think about what you’re making this small mistake – from which you will certainly emerge unscathed – mean for these three. If you fire them today without warning or references, they might never be able to work in this industry again. After devoting years to working for you, they’ll be left with nothing. I don’t have to tell you this doesn’t balance out.”

The three (ex) employees watched Rey with nothing short of awe as she faced down Kylo. She stared at him coolly, willing him to calm enough to think clearly. 

Still too wound up by his imaginings of these sloppy, defective mistakes on display with his name on them, Rey’s attempt at disarmament slid off.

“They are responsible for this mistake, and will be held accountable. Empires are not run by sentiment.”

Rey heard the coldness in Kylo’s voice and her face went stony.

“If this empire is run by short-sighted cruelty, then I don’t think it’s one I want to be part of.”

Rey reached decisively into her own pocket. A moment later, her own keys and ID were banged down onto the table to join the growing pile of similar objects.

The echoing clang of her key hitting the table sent a visible quake through Kylo. His expression emptied of all fury for a moment. But rather than easing back down into self-possession, the opening of uncertainty flared up into a defensive instinct to lash out.

“Perhaps you’ve forgotten how this works.” 

He had never spoken to Rey in a voice so callous, and while self-loathing reared its head at the wrongness of this, a blind desperation had seized hold of him from the sound of her key hitting the table. “You do as I tell you. Nothing more and nothing less.”

Rey actually laughed. It burst from her in utter disbelief. Then she simply shook her head at Kylo in disappointment, as if he were a child who had missed the key school lesson.

“Well. You just watch me do a whole lot more, because your world is a small place indeed.”

And then Rey turned and marched from the room, the other three immediately fleeing after her.

Kylo flinched when the door banged shut behind them. 

In the abrupt silence of the room, Kylo suddenly found it hard to breathe. He couldn’t look away from Rey’s ID card on the table and before he knew what he was doing, his hand had reached out for it. 

How had this come to pass? An uneven hem on one day’s blouse shipments?

It took far too much effort to swallow. There was something solid lodged in his throat, and a bitter, burning taste rising in his mouth.

Even through the leather of his glove, the sharp grooves of Rey’s abandoned key dug into his fingers. 

Indeed, the world had never seemed so small, nor had he ever felt so ridiculous as to have thought himself a giant.

 

Kylo caught her in the hangar bay. He was completely oblivious to his staff and crewmembers, gaping at the sight of their sullen, reticent boss moving at a speed close to a run.

Rey was standing before the open hatch of a speeder, explaining to what must have been the tenth person that yes, she meant it, she was leaving, when she caught sight of Kylo. 

He came to a halt a few yards away, but Rey couldn’t deny her shock to see he was actually breathing hard – his sleek black blazer disheveled and his hair tumbling into his eyes. He took a moment to compose himself. 

“Rey. Before you go, grant me one last chance to speak with you?”

All trace of his anger had gone, and Rey found hers dry as well. She watched his shoulders rising and falling, framing an expression of candid entreaty. Rey fell briefly speechless, because she had never seen Kylo’s guards lowered to bare such sincerity.

“Alright.” 

After a glance around, Rey gestured towards the speeder behind her. It was the only private place in sight. “I promise I won’t take off yet.”

She turned to walk up the ramp, and Kylo followed her in. Once the door sealed behind them, Rey turned to face him in the speeder’s small, circular hallway. She leaned back against the closed door, her arms crossed. She watched him in silence for a moment – receptive but leaving no question that he would have to speak first. 

Kylo’s chin furrowed, his jaw tensed as if chewing the air in his mouth – an acute display of his discomfiture when confronted with a tense or demanding social situation. But he was determined. The challenge of successfully navigating his way through the impending conversation paled before the prospect of failing, and having to watch Rey leave behind her keys.

Kylo couldn’t remember the last time he had apologized for anything. He couldn’t remember ever feeling stretched so desperately thin; Or ever feeling such a deep-seated need to express or create from something other than fabric.

“You were right to stand up for the team. It was a single mistake, and I overreacted. My behavior was incommensurate and unacceptable. And what I said to you…” Kylo needed a moment to pause when bitterness rose in his throat again. He forced speech around it. “I’m sorry, Rey. I promised you would only ever be treated with respect here, and I’ve proved deficient in honoring that.”

Rey’s features softened little by little, the more Kylo spoke. Once he finished, she let her arms relax back to her sides with a long, drawn-out sigh.

“Thank you for apologizing. But this is about more than just me. The problem is how you look down on everyone who works for you – like we’re just the inanimate materials you make your clothes from. Actually… sometimes I think you have more respect for clothes than people.”

Several retorts of defense bubbled behind Kylo’s lips. 

_Clothes never mocked or ostracized me for my ambitions – no matter how unconventional. Clothes reflect the few good parts of me, while people seem to bring out the worst. Clothes cover and hide; People pry and scrutinize._

Kylo clawed it all back. He remained silent, slowly swallowing Rey’s words and feeling them drop into him like stones with distending ripples.

He shifted uncomfortably where he stood. For the first time, he had a true inkling of parallel worlds. He saw not only through the lens of efficiency, quantifiable-material results, but was confronted with the component, integral existence of Rey’s perspective – her contributions, her efforts, her feelings. 

Kylo’s world was powered by visions of his work - from creation, through fittings, to exhibitions, to production - but the process wasn’t a natural imperative by any means. Complacent in his Supreme status, he had taken for granted that each of his concepts would automatically find their way to the shelves of designer stores across the galaxy within a two-month timeframe.

Rey was angry enough to quit because Kylo labored under the false impression of his staff as interfering with the process, rather than enabling it.

It was no coincidence that production had streamlined, markets had expanded, and deliveries had accelerated since he hired Rey. She had already made her mark on Kylo’s world, and he had absolutely no desire to go back to how things were before her. 

One of his employees had actually smiled at him in passing the other day. While he understood that he had Rey to thank for that, he also realized his own attitude and actions were the strongest determinant of those of his employees’ – and by extension, their proficiency. 

“I’ve never had a personal assistant before you. Something about you… You’re the first person I felt that I could trust; Who I could take into confidence and give responsibility to for projects I’ve never trusted to anybody. And you have handled everything so capably, planning with more care than anyone I’ve ever seen. 

“I realized… when you left that room and said you didn’t plan on returning... that I’ve been learning from you. You bring such consideration not only to your work, but to everyone around you. I, too, need to consider the fact that my clothes would never reach any markets without the work of everyone on this ship. I need to remember that without the Quality team, my brand name would have long ago become meaningless.”

By this point, Rey’s reservations had fully cracked. She was clearly beginning to smile at him now, any residual frustration melting away.

“And you’re sure you’re not just saying these nice things because you can’t face the idea of running that charity gala next month all by yourself?”

Kylo tipped an eyebrow, surveying her while the corner of one lip twitched upward.

“I can honestly say I haven’t thought of that blasted charity gala for even an instant.”

Rey couldn’t help a short laugh. “Now that I can believe.”

They were looking directly at each other now, Rey with the twinkle of a laugh in her eyes and Kylo’s gaze softening as his nerves gradually unwound. After the connection held for several long, consuming moments, Rey quickly dropped her gaze to the floor, shifting slightly where she leaned against the wall.

“So?” Kylo ventured, his voice gentle and tentative in a way Rey was unaccustomed to hearing. “Will you withdraw your resignation?”

Rey leaned her head back against the wall, pretending to spend a long moment in protracted consideration. 

Kylo added, “Of course, I’m hiring back the Quality Control team.”

Rey quickly pointed a finger upwards. “One condition. Don’t expect me to call them back for you. You have to do it yourself.”

On instinct, Kylo’s mouth opened to protest such a horrifying prospect. As he’d just learned – apologies were difficult, demanding things. His throat froze. Then, he spent a moment just looking at Rey, and the protests evaporated.

“If you’ll be there to help,” his words haggled, but his tone was little more than a soft entreaty.

Rey nodded, smiling for him again. 

“I will. As long as I can see you’re trying to make good on all you just said – I’ll be there to help.”

“Then you’ll stay?” The words tripped out with a slight hitch, faster than Kylo meant them to in his rush of needing to know for sure. 

This short time since Rey had slammed her keys onto the table was the first in months when Kylo had thought back to life before Rey. Now, he was uncomfortably, worryingly aware of the dark, chaotic emptiness of it, and just the prospect of returning there had evoked a type of fear Kylo had never known an equal to.

Immediately sensing a strange vulnerability for which they were both unprepared, Rey took the few steps forward to where Kylo stood. She tried not to think too much, and just let her feelings dictate what she should do. 

After only a brief second of hesitation, she let her hand follow a natural pull – To reach forward and curl her fingers around Kylo’s left hand. 

Kylo’s eyes briefly flashed while his expression remained inscrutable. But he looked straight into her face, accepting the proffered touch as his fingers slowly folded into the curve of hers. 

Rey whispered, “Yes. I’ll stay.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapters 3 and 4 coming very soon! 
> 
> Chapter 3: The first time Rey and Kylo become lovers. Kylo cajoles Rey to help him with a fitting, and somewhere along the way things begin to defy control or understanding.  
> Chapter 4: It's Rey's third year running Kylo's show at Coruscant Fashion Week - the industry's most high-profile event. Everything goes perfectly until afterwards, when Kylo proposes something that definitely wasn't in the plans.


	3. The Escalation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey confronts Kylo's increasingly odd effects on her. Kylo confronts a crisis of faith in his source of purpose. Together, they move beyond.

“Ow! You’re poking me!”

“If you would just hold still…”

“Well I’m sorry, it’s called breathing! Maybe you shouldn’t make everything so tight!”

Kylo exhaled in an extended, long-suffering breath Rey recognized all too well. It expressed something like _You’ll never understand the demands of high fashion._ Or: _Why must I be burdened with such genius but surrounded by such skeptics._

Rey rolled her eyes to herself. She grumbled, “Can’t believe I let you talk me into doing this again. I swear every time is the last and then…”

All the same, she sighed, gave the skin-tight sleeveless top another twist in attempt to free her lungs just a little, and then let her arms drop back to her sides in capitulation. Kylo had stepped back and crossed his arms by now, watching her with indulgent, over-dramatic patience. 

“Fine, fine, I’ll try and hold still. Then it’ll be over sooner.”

“Thank you,” Kylo said dryly. He stepped close again, pins and tape measure between his fingertips as he resumed work adjusting the top to the contours of Rey’s body. He began moving around her in slow circles of single-minded focus – taking measurements, opening and reclosing seams, occasionally muttering to himself unintelligibly. 

Rey sighed again (but more lightly this time, so as to avoid being stuck by pins) while Kylo seemed to take ages checking some seam on the back. She found it amusing that when it came to creating clothes, he could spend ages with his entire attention absorbed in the smallest detail. But when it came to things related to, well, anything else, he had the shortest patience in the galaxy. 

Kylo came around her left side. His gaze was focused entirely at the level of her waist, where he had placed a hand on the small of her back and was now tracing the line of a seam circling to the front. His eyes were hooded and dark with concentration, and since he towered over her by almost a foot, she found herself without anywhere else to look but right into his face. With his fingers pressed and spread out over the thin layer of fabric, his hand slid over her left hip. Rey’s heartbeat gave an erratic, bizarre spasm. 

He was… very close. 

Rey immediately felt foolish, trying to chide her pounding pulse into calming itself, before he took notice. 

Distraction – She needed a distraction. She thought back to how she had ended up in this position in the first place, wondering how she could have avoided it.

She had been at work in her office adjoining Kylo’s studio, trying to iron out the final details for a major commission project from the Queen of some planet or another… When Kylo had shouted for her from the studio.

Rey had scrambled from her desk to run in, thinking she’d heard genuine distress in his voice. She’d found him standing in front of a dummy model that was half-wrapped in shimmery fabric, frowning so hard his mouth looked in danger of dropping off his face. His hair had the rare disheveled look that only happened when he became well and truly agitated and ran his hands all through it. 

“It’s too shapeless!” he had exclaimed in exasperation, making a sweeping arm gesture in the dummy’s direction, as if this clearly spoke for itself. 

Rey had only crossed her arms and cocked a hip. “And you called me why?”

“Because this is the top that’s supposed to convert into the two-piece gown for next season. It has to fit smoothly so layers can be added on top. But I can’t see how to get the smooth fit when I’m working with a box.”

Rey still wasn’t following. … Until Kylo fully turned to face her, and fixed her with a look equal parts piercing and pleading. 

Rey immediately back-pedaled half a step.

“No. Noooo way. Last time I let you use me as your experiment, you put me in that huge, horrific ball down. It was so heavy, I had back pains for a week.”

“This is the lightest fabric in the galaxy. And it’s only one single, sleeveless layer.” He waved the fabric in his hands in her direction. “You know, most people would be more excited by the chance to do a fitting for me.”

“They don’t know what a slow, effective torturer you are with all your sharp pins and perfectionism.”

Ignoring the jab, his expression was almost supplicating now. “Please, Rey. I can’t make any progress with this until I get the first layer right.”

Rey scrunched up her mouth in annoyance. Heavens above, she hated having to model or do fittings of any kind. She loved planning fashion events from the sidelines – Arranging all the details to make other people look their best in the spotlight, sporting Kylo’s range of designs from classic, to curious, to outrageous – but she hated feeling like she was the spectacle herself. 

Though, here in his studio… No one else would see. And he did look…. rather quite desperate. 

Rey closed her eyes and scrubbed her hands over her face.

“Can’t believe I’m doing this again,” she muttered. Her hands had lowered just in time to see the flash of delight on his face as he practically leapt to push the dummy out of the way so Rey could stand in its spot. 

In hindsight… it hadn’t really taken much cajoling to get her here. 

Rey had been Kylo’s personal assistant for over six months now, but the job was coming to feel less and less like work every day. It had taken her the first month to gain the measure of him – His dry, often dark sarcasm; His penchant for dramatics; His occasional tantrums. By the end of month three, Rey had learned to anticipate and respond to his moods well enough that they stopped being demanding. 

By month four, it finally set in for Kylo that Rey had the patience and resilience to not only tolerate him with all his highs and lows, but to support him through the lows and propel his highs still further. Gradually, creation and calm started coming much easier than they ever had before. 

(Not to mention the revenues, thanks to Rey’s detailed budgeting and efficient management.) 

For a long time, Kylo had been used to suffering for his work. Until Rey had entered, sweeping up and tidying the disorder and manic struggle that had too often characterized Kylo’s business chains and twisted the enjoyment from his art. 

And so, by months five and six, Supreme Designer Kylo Ren was producing his most successful and talked-about pieces to date. Sales of his past fashion lines were skyrocketing across star systems everywhere – including the new breakout markets Rey had painstakingly researched and targeted. His staff was just the right size – Plenty to ensure no one was overworked, but thin enough that salaries were high and productivity soared. 

Kylo had never been someone who voiced emotions very well. (Hence why he relied on other mediums.) Gratitude was especially difficult, unaccustomed as he was to having any reason for humility. But by month six, Rey had her own private speeder just like him, several landmark new pieces with names incorporating hers, and the only thing Kylo threw fits about anymore was if scheduling kept her from attending official events at his side.

It had taken Rey a little while to understand this final contradiction in him. He behaved compulsively aloof. Yet, his sardonic attitude towards everyone around him paled only to his self-deprecation. He knew he was the best at what he did, and his behavior reflected the awareness perfectly – But he could never stand in front of a microphone or a reporter’s flashing camera and proclaim confident superiority. 

He needed Rey for that.

Yes, she did his scheduling, and fielded media inquiries about his new projects, and made sure all the models for the upcoming show were brunettes so they wouldn’t clash with his color scheme… But she also spoke for him when he ran out of words and strength to deal with the world. And when necessary (she always instinctively knew when), she cut off the world for him entirely, protecting the calm of his studio and the sanctity of his creative space.

Now that she thought about it… She was the only person he had let into his studio for weeks now. The thought brought her promptly careening back into the present moment.

His still stood much too close. By now, a pin had transferred to up between his lips. His eyes were narrowed in concentration while his fingers adjusted fabric along Rey’s stomach. 

A soft intake of breath and a light kindling in his eyes evidenced the right fit had finally been attained. Rey was whole-heartedly glad for his complete absorption in her midsection, so he didn’t see her gaze closely follow his lips as they gave up the pin to his fingers, then pursed together in deliberate, gentle concentration as he pinned fabric at Rey’s navel.

“Perfect. … Perfect,” Kylo said, first a murmur, then a declaration. He bared one of his rare, genuine smiles, the ones that only saw the light behind closed doors, and now there was no mistaking the acrobatic lurch of Rey’s heart. 

How in the world had she let this happen?

His eyes skimmed up to her face, but Rey could only take a moment to appreciate the soft light that had spread into them, before the glow of their attention made her clear her throat in attempt to stifle her rising blush.

“Yeah? Well, glad I could help. Now how am I supposed to get myself out of this?”

Kylo put on an exaggerated frown dangerously nearing a pout. “You don’t want to keep it on for little while? It looks terrific on you.”

He took half a step back, surveying her up and down with open appreciation. Rey knew she needed to defuse the situation quickly before she gave herself away. 

Luckily, Kylo went on to ask innocently, “Would you consider putting yourself on the ad campaign?”

Rey laughed out loud. “Never in a million years! Haven’t I done my part already in realizing your vision here?”

Kylo gave an exaggerated sigh, “I suppose yes, indeed you have. I can’t ask you to suffer any more.”

“Much obliged.”

Rey held her arms out, so that Kylo’s precise, practiced fingers could pluck away the pins and begin unraveling the fabric he had wound around her torso. When he leaned in close, so his arms could briefly cross behind her back in the course of unwrapping, Rey held her breath, even though it only made her heart speed further. 

He was incredibly warm – She could feel the heat of him through clothes and the mere inches of space between them. And he was so much bigger than her, not only taller but broad in the chest – his shoulders probably one and half the span of her own. Rey felt like she was hanging at a precipice. The drop would be the moment when, simply by closing his arms the slightest bit, Kylo would capture her between them and she would melt away against him.

Her frantic, dangerous thoughts suddenly lurched in panic when Kylo pulled a pin loose at her back and something slipped entirely out of place. Moving in a flash of reflex when Kylo’s hands began retreating, Rey’s hands shot up to catch his forearms, holding him in place.

“Hm? What is it?” 

Held still by her, Kylo tilted his head down to look into her face questioningly. This time, there was no fighting her rising blush when her gaze met his, unmistakable in the extreme proximity. The question faded from his face, taking on instead an edge of bewildered, fascinated captivity to the wildfire in her gaze. The simmer of their physical reactions to each other screamed unmistakably in the long, burning shock of a moment.

“It’s just…” She wet her lips, readjusted her hands to hold his wrists a bit more tightly in place, then steeled herself to say what she needed to say. “I think you… unhooked everything. Pull that off and it all comes off.”

Kylo’s lips parted, formed a small O, then pressed tightly back together again. It took every ounce of Rey’s willpower not to lick her own lips in response.

“I-…I’m sorry.” His voice came out soft and hoarse, like Rey had never heard before. She swallowed visibly, and Kylo’s eyes tracked the movement of her throat. “I’ll… hold on for a moment until you grab it, then I’ll let go and turn around.”

“Okay,” Rey breathed. Her fingers uncurled slowly, almost regretfully, from Kylo’s wrists. Her hands immediately felt cold. She made sure she had both hands holding her undergarment in place before she gave Kylo a slight nod. “Okay,” she said again, and for a ridiculous moment, it was the only word she seemed to be able to remember.

His gaze was focused only on her face – a heady mixture of fascination, fervent focus, and slight agitation. Rey had thought she knew the whole catalogue of Kylo’s expressions, but this one entirely eluded classification. All she could sense without a doubt was its intensity – the way it seemed to almost glue Kylo to the spot where he stood, with his hands lingering at the small of her back. Rey swore she could feel a magnetism drawing her in through his eyes – piercing in their focus, yet clouded with some powerful hunger – compelling her closer to the heat of him that was nearly enveloping her.

Rey’s fingers clenched more tightly around the straps of her clothes, and in so doing one of her fingers bumped into Kylo’s hand. The slight touch evoked an abrupt jolt in him, his eyes clearing and softening again. He straightened up from where he’d been leaning down into Rey’s space.

“Sorry,” he mumbled again as he withdrew his hands. He held them in front of him for a moment, as if at a loss what to do. Rey swallowed a large, difficult breath that was a strange mixture of disappointment and surging affection. She mourned the loss of electric physical contact; Yet it heated her heart with entirely different power to witness him shift so quickly from a concentrated, blazing force of attraction back into the ungainly man who often seemed to struggle fitting into his own towering frame, or voicing the inner sentiments that filled and drove him.

Belatedly remembering his own plan, Kylo took a large step back from Rey and turned around to face the opposite direction. He crossed his hands behind his back, and Rey watched his fingers fiddle together nervously. She had never seen him so off-step, almost child-like in the total derailment of his normal bluster and over-active perfectionism.

Then, Rey let herself really consider what had just happened between them. She thought about the fact that Kylo was plenty rich, famous, and attractive enough to find bedmates on demand. And yet never once had she seen him show the slightest interest in taking advantage of his preeminent position. Even on the few memorable occasions when attractive models had quite literally thrown themselves at him, Kylo had always disengaged in record time and immediately shifted attention elsewhere.

He didn’t seem capable of doing that now. He was still standing still, still staring ahead at the wall of his studio, his fingers still weaving together then apart then together again in compulsive evidence of his discomposure. 

For her own part, Rey knew it would be impossible for her to simply hitch her clothes back into their proper place and march from the room. Even when she couldn’t see his face, invisible threads continued tying her to the place where he stood.

She needed to stop thinking. This was something that could never be thought through or rationalized away. The groundswell surging up in her gave perfect, distinct clarity she no longer cared to understand.

She knew she wanted him too close again. She wanted those wide hands to span her waist again. She needed to give in to what felt so rightly compelling.

She had an idea. Rey had never been bold in quite this way before, but then again, nothing about this whole scenario was in any way familiar. She felt as if she’d become an entirely different person in only the last few minutes, as deeply hidden desire reared its head and refused to be tamed.

Rey began unwinding Kylo’s strange idea of a top. She was sure it would indeed look stunning paired with the gown he envisioned, but right now it just seemed like an irritating, skin-tight nuisance. Finally, it dropped in a pile at her feet. Without pausing to let her more sensible thoughts catch up, Rey let everything else above the waist fall as well. 

Rey had never especially enjoyed looking in the mirror. She knew she had almost no figure to speak of – Her chest almost entirely flat and her waist all straight lines devoid of slopes or curves. 

Yet, she did enjoy the way she looked in Kylo’s clothes when she attended events with him. Within the first month of working for him, he had almost entirely replaced her wardrobe without a thought to her consent or opinions. Eventually, Rey had accepted that there was no use objecting to pieces that seemed too outlandish or showy for her to pull off. Annoyingly, Kylo was always right about everything he gave her. Every outfit made her look and feel incredible.

But clothes weren’t what made Rey strip down to bareness. All she could see in her mind was the way Kylo had looked at her moments ago… As if looking straight into her innermost depths, and fighting to hold himself back from plunging in.

Rey toed off her shoes before taking small steps closer to where Kylo stood – Still with his back towards her, fingers still weaving together and apart. She was now clad in only the simple pair of trousers she had been wearing all day. They hung low on her slim hips, while their billowing fabric shrouded the straight drops of her legs. Rey felt heated from the inside, flushed even while the air in the studio drew goose bumps across her skin.

“Kylo.”

Her voice echoed the same deep rasp his had held apologizing. His attention aroused by the unique sound, he turned back towards her.

And froze, his eyes immediately blown wide and his expression wiped out in surprise. He’d clearly expected her to be in _more_ rather than a _less_ state of dress.

Then she moved closer, so his surprise wouldn’t be of the wrong nature. She murmured his name again as she reached forward to take his hands in her own. 

Their linked hands hung in the air between them. Rey focused on them for a long moment – The way his long, surprisingly delicate fingers interwove with and cradled hers; The way his hands were big enough to almost entirely hide hers. When she slowly dared to look up, she found him gazing at her with every bit of the fiery intensity from before, with a new edge of questioning, unsure complexity.

Rey’s lips opened, at first just so she could find breath. Then, she made herself speak: “Is this just as perfect?”

She wished she hadn’t sounded so small and unsure, but the fact was she had never bared herself like this to any other man.

Kylo drew a deep, stuttering breath. His chin trembled for a moment, as the aroused gloss in his eyes cracked apart to reveal tender adoration.

“More so… I could never make beauty like this.”

Rey bit down on her smile. She squeezed his hands until he squeezed back. When she released the pressure, his thumbs stroked the delicate skin of her inner wrists. Goosebumps surged up her arms, drawing a slight shiver from her. He noticed, felt, and watched the tremor pass through her. He swallowed with difficulty, suddenly short of breath. He could no longer restrain his gaze from falling to her chest. He watched the in-out surge-and-fall of each racing breath she took. Scalding, icy heat sunk into him as he took in each individual bump and freckle that ringed her nipples.

From her inner wrists, his fingers began a slow, exploratory journey upwards. Once he reached her elbows, she laid her own hands at his waist, her fingers twisting into the fabric of his shirt. 

Making torturously slow progress, his hands hesitated along her upper arms. Skimming over her skin, his fingers shifted in to trace up along her sides. His thumbs smoothed only once over the sensitive softness of her breasts, but she shuddered all the same. The dark heat that unfolded in his eyes well made up for the brevity of the caress.

Rey would have said his hands held the same measuring, almost academic focus he devoted to his design work – but for the way they trembled slightly, and his face entirely lacked composure. There was only passionate, blazing interest, with none of his usual control. His eyes darted back and forth between her face and the level of his hands – now resting along the front curve of her shoulders as his thumbs mapped the shape and dips along her collarbone. 

In his head, Kylo was lost in Rey and spinning worlds away from her at the same time. The inimitable, delicate softness of her skin, the way her frame arched slightly closer to meet his touch wrapped him in awe he’d never known before. Yet there was a layer of frustration – That there existed an entire realm of the exquisite Kylo had never before experienced. And in its very existence, it defied control or mastery. 

What had always guided his devotion to hours of measuring, designing, and creating? He had always assumed the motivation lay in the search for an aesthetic of purity and beauty that allowed the quotidian to ascend to something more. But even his greatest creations, his most celebrated and lucrative pieces, even his proudest moments of seeing some experimental new design on a model suited perfectly for it – They were nothing like this. They were pale and grey compared to all this washing over him. This precious moment of privilege: To see and touch Rey in all her natural, primal power and grace. 

There came a flash of despair in Kylo’s heart, because she was indeed more perfect than anything else he had ever known, and anything he ever made would crumble in pitiful imitation.

Then that dark, hopeless moment shrunk and faded when she slid her hands up his back, and he felt her fingers sink in over his shoulder blades to reel him an inch closer. Incomprehensible warmth and joy coursed through him, and again it was something far beyond the realm of Good created by man’s hand. It was a deeply personal, intensely moving surge of feeling – threatening to lift him straight off the ground where he stood and propel him irreversibly into her. It was an elation and need entirely divided from anything in the material world. He felt it transforming him; and though it would forever elude his understanding, it granted a sudden revelation.

He did not design in search of some lofty aesthetic standard that might dress up a world of sadness, violence, and disappointment. He designed in a compulsive, unconscious search for _THIS_ – For exultation; To be touched by a force greater and gentler than all that made up a world of harsh truths and bitter realities. 

The clothes themselves were vain, meaningless simulacrum. It wasn’t the objects themselves that brought him satisfaction or comfort. But they had been his means for communion with people in star systems across the galaxy. They had created a channel for contribution and adulation – To feel like he was part of something greater, that he was an essential part in peoples’ joy. All this, when he often found it impossibly difficult to carry on a conversation about anything more personal than his sense of next season’s tones and colors.

Of course, nothing he ever created could ever approach Rey’s splendor, or recreate the force filling him now with its exquisite compulsion. That was because this moment was comprised of _both_ of them. Rey stood there like the vision of divinity, and yet Kylo knew his heart’s struggle to break straight through his chest to reach her was also borne of an attachment he’d harbored long before she walked into this room on this evening.

“Kylo…? Are you still with me?” 

Her voice had gone slightly timid again. Kylo couldn’t help his mouth lilting upwards, because it was so charmingly incongruous to her usual fierceness. He swept one thumb across the hollow dip at the base of her throat, humbled to experience this softly uncertain side of her that was so rarely displayed.

Feeling his heart racing through every inch of him, Kylo cupped the fingers of one hand gently around the side of her neck. His breath escaped in a soft shudder as his fingertips stroked the edge of her jaw.

“I am only ever with you.”

Blinking up at him, every inch of her growing almost unbearably hot beneath the weight of his unwavering gaze, she never wanted to look away. While one hand gripped at his back still more tightly, she lifted the other to meet his hand where it cupped her neck. She laid her own hand over his, weaving a few of their fingers together and coaxing his fingers to lay flat against her skin.

Each second, they gravitated closer and closer together. From one moment to the next, they erased the space between them, breathing in and savoring the exhilarating charge of their proximity; Drinking in the moment and sinking slowly into the collapse. Each wondered whether there would be a way to pass over the ledge without plummeting uncontrollably. 

Without total and unconditional surrender.

Rational thought stopped on both sides, and so their lips drifted into each other’s in irresistible gravitation, before the fully formed idea of a kiss even reached their minds. Naked, unbridled longing to search the sacred unknown guided the tilt of their heads and the slow exchange of heart-stopping breath between careful, reverent lips. Their mouths moved with the same languid wonder that had thickened their thoughts. Once the taste of him had thoroughly permeated through her, Rey released the hint of a moan that made knives twist into him and the kiss fall off as his lips lost the rhythm.

Time seemed to tremble and slow around them, struggling to hold the weight of desire and awe that had been loosed between them. Neither could say they were entirely surprised by what the other had evoked in them, only stunned by its magnitude.

Eyes closed, they breathed in each other’s essence as their foreheads rested together. Kylo’s hands slid to grip her elbows, finally pulling every inch of her directly against his own body, as close as she could come. Rey found the hand fisted in the back of his shirt incapable of letting go. Her free hand moved forward blindly to his chest. It reflexively gripped fabric for a moment before clutching upwards to where the buttons parted to reveal blessed bare skin.

“Kylo,” she breathed, an admonishment and endearment at the same time. “You’re too dressed.”

“Mm.”

It took a long moment before Kylo could muster more of a reply. Then he became gradually aware of the electricity in Rey’s fingertips where they nudged his collar away to find skin. The sensation pierced through the haze that had enveloped his senses from the press of her body so close against him.

A rumbling sound of assent issued from his chest. He wet his lips and did his best to remember the workings of speech.

“Would you like to tend to that problem, or should I?”

Rey smiled to herself reflexively. She opened her eyes just enough to nudge her nose against his. 

“You know I love nothing more than tending to your problems.”

Rey chased the automatic, thoughtless smile of amusement that rose on Kylo’s lips with a brief kiss. 

Really, she should have recognized the first warning signs months ago. Kylo’s real smiles came so rarely, Rey had found herself cherishing each one even more than the last. They had each made him more dear to her; Each fissure in the haughty, somber shell betraying the wary sensitivity beneath. Here between the walls of his personal studio, she had seen the self-sacrifice and exposure necessary for him to tailor his deepest longings and passions into craft worshipped and clamored for across countless planets and star systems. 

He presented the indifferent face of business, sales, and profits, but commercial success never moved him. The rare smiles came when a model succeeded in embodying what the clothes _meant_ , when a critic praised his designs not for the immaculate fit and presentation but for their originality, or when - after sketching and resketching, measuring and remeasuring - a knot inside of him too insistent to ignore finally took shape before him in fabric.

Of course, Rey couldn’t know that it was only since she had started working for him that Kylo’s smile had really started to exist at all. Neither could she know that in his mind, their cause was something entirely different – something that had nothing to do with clothes.

Rey’s kiss, light and affectionate though it had been, ignited the air around them anew. In a bare instant, they were thrown from languid intimacy into the throws of desperate hunger. Rey found herself gasping for breath as her fingers hurriedly tore the buttons of Kylo’s shirt open. His hands pressed flat against Rey’s lower back before sliding up to map every inch of her bare back and shoulders. They circled down and back up with the desperation of a drowning man seeking anything to latch on to. He was forced to abandon the search when Rey pulled his shirt open all the way and began pushing it over his shoulders, and he had to release her so she could drag the garment off him. Their lips found each other’s in a messy, desperate need to compensate. 

Now, it was Rey’s turn to feel her way hungrily over expanses of bare skin. And when Kylo’s hands came back to her, one arm circled her waist in a bout of strength that pulled her entire body flush against him, while his other hand rushed to press one of her breasts with the boldness she had yearned for. Rey sucked one of his lips between her teeth as his thumb rolled over her nipple. With one of her hands caught between their bodies in mid-exploration, she became aware only slowly of the hard press of defined abdominal muscles. She shuddered when he breathed her name against her teeth, responding to the bite mark she’d left with an insistent clench at her breast.

The room lacked anything resembling a bed. His mind spilling miles beyond rational thought, Kylo cast about frantically for any flat surface where he could spread Rey out to see and access every inch of her. His desk… or the wide divan against the wall. 

He made a snap decision, and his body obeyed instantly. He extricated his lips from hers just long enough to grip the backs of her thighs and lift her from the floor in one fluid motion. The shape and size of her fit to him seamlessly – her legs hooking over his hips and her arms encircling his neck as naturally as breathing. 

Breathing hard in his hold, her feet entirely off the floor and nothing but his strength and heat surrounding and grounding her, Rey knew she would have let him do or take anything he wanted. And yet her heart raced in euphoria, every nerve in her whole body alive with joyous thrill, because she knew without having to ask, without having to speak a word, that all his desires complemented her own. She knew she could entrust her very body and soul to him – knew it as surely as the planets turned and the stars burned.

He carried her swiftly and effortlessly across the room, yet she couldn’t waste even those short moments. She sunk fingers into his hair, tugging his head back and upwards so her mouth could reach his again. Kylo’s foot banged against the corner of the divan when Rey sunk her tongue between his lips, but his brain only processed the rough caress of her tongue against his, the tingling where she pulled his hair slightly, and above all the searing heat where her thighs wrapped around him.

He spilled her onto the cushions and immediately fell over her, seizing his own chance to sink hands into her hair and claim her mouth for his own. She pushed back from beneath him, her tongue challenging his and only relenting when she grew distracted by the difficult buttons of his pants. 

Her noise of frustration broke the kiss as she gave his waistband a final futile tug. 

“Your damn fancy trousers, I swear…” 

She went on to swear quite forcefully, making Kylo chuckle just enough to let her go just for the moment, so he could sit up on his knees over her and undo the buttons himself.

“This is probably the only time I’ll say this…,” Kylo started, his voice a stirring blend of rough and light-hearted that Rey had never heard but immediately adored, “But I’m glad you’re wearing those cheap pants with no proper buttons.”

“I’ve told you a million times, you’ll never beat these for comfort. I know it kills you that you didn’t make them…”

He made a scoffing sound, tossing his head to throw hair from his eyes as he interjected, “Like I would put my name on those tasteless tragedies.”

At any other time, Rey would have had a smart retort. But just then, she could only bite her lip and continue sweeping her gaze from Kylo’s face, down his bare, defined chest, to where he was swiftly undoing his pants and pushing them down off his hips. 

“Well,” Rey whispered, watching him shed his overly-expensive leather-whatever pants and toss them onto the floor, then bend over her again in only underwear, “If you hate them so much, I’ll let you get rid of them for me.”

Kylo pretended to consider the offer for a moment. “I suppose that’s a fair trade for making my eyes endure them all this time.”

“Very fair, I would say. But -…” At her suddenly serious tone, Kylo’s hands froze mid-rush to her waist, his gaze anxiously finding her face again. She finished, “I get to do your pretentious underwear.”

Kylo’s expression cracked in relieved amusement. He couldn’t help taking a moment to lower himself all the way over her again to kiss her in a fond rush. He murmured on the pull back, “Only if I get to do your cheap ones.”

Rey gripped his shoulders and pulled him down again for a firmer, deeper kiss. When she released him, she assented, “Deal.”

A hurried scramble ensued. Kylo divested Rey of her pants with such fervor, one would have thought they had done him a grievous wrong. Rey grabbed for Kylo’s underwear with the intention of matching his speed, but then to her own alarm found her fingers lingering over the incredibly soft fabric.

She spotted the smirk beginning on his face, and immediately scrunched her nose in affected distaste. Without ceremony, she shoved them down far enough for him to kick them clear.

Then, everything caught up with her all in a swift rush. 

His proximity. His heat. His complete nakedness. 

She sensed him grow serious in the same moment as her. She felt his attentive caution, the way he shifted over her to put slightly more space between them until he was sure she was comfortable.

Lost in feeling for a moment, Rey’s fingers brushed either side of Kylo’s bare hips. Her fingertips trailed thoughtfully upwards, feeling the strong lines of his waist and abdomen; Savoring the soft, simple beauty of his uncovered skin. 

Above her, he breathed slowly and deeply, holding himself still even in the awkward position of frozen suspension. He watched her face watching her fingers, taken aback by what seemed like wonder in her eyes. 

Rey watched the slow, heaving motion of his chest; Stared transfixed where the muscles in his stomach tensed and fluttered slightly in response to her inquisitive touch. Rey felt an outpouring of light warming her from within, as she saw with her own eyes that his body was just as sensitive and responsive as his soul. He usually kept himself wrapped in expensive black clothes and sturdy leather, but beneath all the harsh, finely designed layers was something more beautiful and precious than all the rest.

Rey’s fingers completed their upward journey, gently cupping his face while she did her best to channel in her eyes the depth of her understanding and tenderness for him. She coaxed him back down to his previous proximity, stroking his face to allay the wordless questions of his searching gaze.

She whispered, “It’s your turn now.”

And with a deep breath, she lifted her hips just enough to meet his. His breath skidded to a freeze when her heat met his, even through the thin layer of clothing she still wore. 

“Are you…”

“Yes,” Rey cut him off sharply, but tempered the words with a gentle smile. “Kylo, I’m sure.”

His eyes searched hers for a long, intimate moment. At first he sought to check her certainty… but then he found himself fully diving in to all she was sharing in her open, loving gaze. And in a final, lingering moment of insecurity, he searched for reassurance that this meant to her all it did to him. 

Her fingers stroked over his cheek once more, and he finally fell past all thought of self-preservation – leaving behind any need for fear. 

He turned his head to kiss her fingertips. Then he reached down to remove the final layer between them. 

 

To move in unison came without thought, without effort. Whenever she reached out in need, he would be there to kiss her skin, kiss her lips, to hold her closer. Whenever he grew momentarily weak from the intensity of it all, her fervor would find him and lead him to clarity again. The sweat that beaded along her neck was the sweetest thing he had ever tasted; While the burning strain in her hips to let him in still deeper was the most satisfying pain she had ever known.

He was louder than she. Sometimes Rey consciously found herself trying to ring every last moan from him, wrapping herself as tightly to him as possible and ignoring the strain in her neck so she could lift her head to taste the exquisite sounds straight from his lips.

Other times Rey lost all thread of conscious thought. Kylo channeled an intensity of strength that utterly consumed her, only rarely losing speed or rhythm. In its most intense moments, Rey’s entire universe distilled down to him – the line of where she ended and he began constantly ebbing and fluctuating and sending her reeling through breathless peaks. 

When she begged him “Don’t stop,” she meant not _ever_ , because she couldn’t imagine anything ever being more meaningful, more powerful. Because it seemed unbearable that it would end – that he would eventually leave her body and stop making her feel this infinite.

So she clutched him as close as she could, kissed him as hard as she dared, and equal parts driven on and cowed by her intensity, Kylo hung on as long as he could endure. From the outside, Rey had already become the most captivating and treasured part of his life. From the inside, she was beyond all description. She was a whole universe of secret, unimaginable revelation and rapture. She unmade him and rebuilt him, again and again and again. When she cried out his name in the final moments, he could have worshipped her. 

He panted against her skin in the aftermath, her arms wrapped tight to cradle him as close as she could. His total loss of control at the end had been what finally did it for her – Watching the rapture on his face come dangerously close to undoing him, knowing it was her making him feel something of such power, and then his final desperate, primal burst of strength thrust her suddenly into endless depths of blistering pleasure that closed over her head and robbed her of all breath. 

Not until he surrendered a soft whimper against her shoulder did she find reality again, finally relaxing her legs where they’d been hooked around him to let him find his way free. He heaved for breath, and her arms came around him instinctively. 

She had feared emptiness, but with their bodies still tangled together from head to toe, her fingers carding shakily through his hair, and her name escaping his lips in trembling whispers, she had never felt more complete.

 

Once the sweat cooled and Kylo felt Rey begin to shiver, he leaned over to fumble rather gracelessly for one of the sample swathes of fabric folded beside the divan, large enough to become a makeshift blanket.

The contented sigh she gave once she had rolled back under his arm, settling her head against the crook of his shoulder, made Kylo almost certain he would never feel cold again. She let her eyes slip slowly closed, and he shifted his head just enough so he could gaze at her. His eyes unhurriedly savored her details, softened and blurred and sweetened by her immediate proximity.

“Kylo?” she asked in a deep mumble, shifting and stretching against him. She slowly opened her eyes again, a smile curling her lips when one of Kylo’s hands began making slow, gentle strokes up and down her back.

“Yes?”

“What were you thinking about, beforehand? When you were still dressed, just touching me. You were silent for a long time.”

In Kylo’s memory, those minutes had been a tumultuous storm. But now he found himself on the other side. Now, with her warmth curled close and all of her relaxed and trusting in his arms, he knew he had a beacon that could guide him through even the fiercest tempest. 

“I was … looking at you, and I realized that just standing there, naked, you looked more resplendent than anyone wearing any of my clothes will ever look. But then I understood…. The way you looked to me in that moment: That’s what I’ve spent my whole life trying to create, and I never will. It’s impossible. But that’s okay, because you’ve shown it to me.”

Rey took a deep, slow breath, letting it all sink in. Her body was still processing the lingering remnants of him inside her; Some secret corners deep inside still thrumming with life where he had taken and given in rough but balanced measure. 

And every bit as physical and real was the sweet ache burning through her heart. He had reached his way there somehow, and still she felt his touch upon it, infinitely tender and careful.

Rey’s fingers made their way slowly up his chest to his face, savoring every inch of the journey. Finally reaching their destination, she slowly pulled him in until her mouth could reach his – until she could taste the bracing honesty on his lips and tongue, and let him explore her own. She yearned to return an equal declaration – to voice that everything he had made her feel had reshaped her world with new vibrancy and meaning.

But in that moment, she couldn’t have mustered a single word anyway. She kissed him with the slow glimmer of moonlight and the enduring warmth of suns.

For she wanted to show him everything; Everything the universe had to offer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one... really got away from me. These two took me on a really intense emotional journey here I didn't consciously plan to undertake. Seriously, my plan was "okay time to write their first time" and then all this appeared! I have no explanation. What classic Reylo for you there. :')
> 
> My original one-shot that kickstarted this whole verse takes place sometime between this part and the next. If you haven't seen it, I'd recommend tucking it in here! http://archiveofourown.org/works/13375356


	4. The Completion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kylo faces his deepest fears for the sake of something ultimate. Rey's world is shaken. Together, they watch morning come.

It was Rey’s third year attending Coruscant Fashion Week, and she still had to pinch herself. It remained surreal; Rey of Jakku _here_ , surrounded by royals, aristocrats, and millionaires. Every inch of the affluent city gleaming and decorated for the unrivaled crowning jewel of the galaxy-wide Fashion industry, while balls and banquets spilled out from every quarter of the city. Each night’s revelry would grow increasingly lavish, leading up to the final night’s gala exhibition; Headlined, of course, by none other than Supreme Designer Kylo Ren. 

“Stop messing with it,” Kylo muttered as he reached up a hand to help Rey step out from the hovercraft after him. She gripped his hand tightly enough to make him cover a wince. Her sharp-pointed heels were much taller than she cared for, and she didn’t trust herself to release his hand until she had both feet firmly on the ground and could take his arm in a death grip instead.

“Sorry,” she hissed, trying hard not to look too closely at the countless reporters, paparazzi, and flashing cameras crowding each side of the red carpet leading into the massive, ridiculously opulent exhibition hall – More a palace than an auditorium. “It’s just... it’s very short.”

Again, Rey’s fingers compulsively tugged at the petaled hem of her dress, where it landed mid-thigh. The sleeved bodice, woven of pastel pink and orange silks, flowed down over her waist and hips into the glittering approximation of flower petals – a bold yet perfect complement to her pale, creamy skin. Kylo had made her do three different fittings to ensure it would be perfect. Rey had rolled her eyes a lot, and told Kylo more than once that he was wasting too much time and effort for a dress design he would only make one single time. Kylo had only hushed her and continued working. 

He had a strange insistence that whatever he designed for Rey couldn’t be worn by anyone else. It wouldn’t bother Rey if a few of her pieces went on the market – At least it would stop the constant inquiries into her wardrobe. But deep down, she did have to admit to a certain amount of pleasure, knowing that Kylo devoted time to creating designs with only her in mind.

“Trust me,” Kylo murmured back, “You look radiant.”

He pulled her hand away from the hem of her dress, clutching it for one extra, lingering moment before turning to face down the flashes and shouts of the red carpet. 

Rey squared her shoulders, willing herself to shake off her petty timidity.

Kylo crooked his elbow out. Rey curled her arm through, laying her hand tightly enough over the exorbitantly soft and expensive arm of his suit to loosen the apprehensive strain of his features.

Together, they advanced and conquered the red carpet.

 

To the surprise of neither, Kylo’s summit exhibition went off flawlessly. 

Watching the models take their final turn across the long runway from the shelter of a dark, secluded corner of the wings, Rey let out a long sigh of relief. She swore she could literally feel the weight of weeks and weeks of meticulous, obsessive planning finally dropping from her shoulders. Beside her, Kylo was mentally preparing himself for the approaching moment when he would have to take the stage himself for the show’s conclusion. For this instant, though, he did his best to savor the triumph. After this, the top-tier Coruscant market would be in the palm of his hand.

Rey nudged him with her elbow. When he looked towards her, her wide grin nearly glowed in the dark. 

“You did it,” she murmured, lifting her hands to clap them lightly against his chest. “We won’t be able to ship the new lines out quickly enough. We’ll probably have to expand production plans.”

Looking at Rey smiling up at him in the dark while on the other side of the curtain, the crowd applauded their achievement with raucous enthusiasm, Kylo wasn’t thinking about production plans.

His hands found Rey’s waist, while hers stilled against his chest.

“We did it,” he amended.

Rey’s smile blossomed into a full-on grin.

“I suppose I did help a bit.” 

The audience still thundered outside, but it all filtered away as Kylo bent close enough for his breath to find hers.

“Just a bit.”

And then he kissed her – slowly, thoroughly, and appreciatively – while her hands slid their way over his shoulders and his arms circled her waist one and a half times, drawing her in tight as the companion piece he would never be whole again without.

The sound of a discreet cough intruded on their infinite feedback loop. 

“Um. I’m sorry – Sir? They’re ready for you on stage.”

Kylo pulled back with a mournful yet resigned sigh. Rey lingered in the moment just a little while longer, not quite letting him go yet.

“I’ll be right back,” he murmured.

“Good. I’ll be here.”

When Kylo emerged from parted curtains onto a center stage bathed in light, the entire auditorium leapt to their feet and the cries of adulation grew almost deafening. 

Yet, something curious happened. The earsplitting roar of the crowd seemed modulated to bearable levels in Kylo’s ears. Even the flash bulbs rushing to the stage to capture him couldn’t blur his sight. 

Compared with the intensity of Rey, this whole packed massive auditorium became perfectly tame. 

Kylo took his bow, then held his hand out for the microphone to address the Fashion Week regalia.

“There are many who share in this triumph and celebration tonight…”

 

Rey watched the streets fill with revelers, flooding with the lights of late-night clubs and parties spilling out into the night. From way up here, looking out through the open glass wall of Kylo’s suite, the city below looked like little more than a sparkling toy model.

Rey swirled the wine in her glass, thinking how glad she was to be up here in peace and quiet – Wrapped in nothing but a fluffy, cashmere robe.

She heard the door to the massive, marble-tiled bathroom open, then Kylo coming back into the bedroom. In the window’s reflection, she could see he had just emerged from the shower. His damp hair still clung to his neck, and he wore only simple sleep pants slung low on his hips. (Though for Kylo, “simple” still meant made from some ridiculously fine and expensive material.) 

In the reflection, she watched him carry his suit over to the closet, where he painstakingly smoothed creases out of each garment before hanging them. He paused before closing the closet door again, taking a moment to trail his fingers along Rey’s gown where it hung beside his own removed formal wear.

Rey did love the dress. It had been as soft and light as a cloud to wear, and was probably one of her favorites of the many pieces Kylo had made for her. But she would never, ever tell him the truth: No matter how stunning his designs were, Rey’s favorite part of the day was always getting out of them. She just didn’t _enjoy_ being attention-grabbing. But she _did_ enjoy the way Kylo’s face would light up whenever she first tried on something of his. Dressing up was his passion, so she could live with doing it for him.

After his short remarks at the show’s end, Kylo had been flooded by press, industry execs, and adoring admirers. Back stage, Rey had taken charge of the wrap-up. It had been their biggest, most elaborate show of the year and there would be ships upon ships of wardrobes and cargo to pack before departure. Rey appointed managing staff to see nothing was left behind, and coordinated plans between each different department to ensure the pack-up could be completed within two days. 

Only then did she let herself fully recognize how badly her feet were aching in those blasted heels. Kylo hadn’t appeared back stage yet, meaning he was still neck-deep in interviews and press segments. 

Rey found one of the younger, newer assistants – Someone Rey knew would be only too thrilled to spend as much time in the exhibition palace as possible.

“Sofi, could you give these to Kylo when he finishes with press?” Her face already simultaneously reddening and brightening at the prospect of a task that included _direct interaction_ with Kylo, Sofi was all too happy to be entrusted with the keys to his suite. “Tell him I went back already. Once you’ve seen him off, you go on out and enjoy yourself, okay? We all deserve it.” 

After the short ride to the hotel (naturally, the event sponsors had reserved for Kylo one of the largest suites in one of the planet’s grandest hotels), Rey’s first concern had been kicking off her blasted heels. After hanging up her dress with all the care it deserved, she’d drawn herself the hottest bath she could stand in the shining, pearl-white tub. 

She had soaked for perhaps an hour, her eyes beginning to slide closed in the first true relaxation she’d had in weeks, when she finally heard Kylo come in. Almost immediately, she heard him push open the bathroom door in search of her. Rey didn’t open her eyes, but smiled a little to acknowledge his entrance. 

He still had his overly expensive shoes on – they squeaked against the gleaming bathroom floor. Rey heard the rustling sound of him kneeling beside the tub. A moment later came the gentle brush of his fingers over her hair.

“Sorry. I didn’t come back right away.”

“Everyone wanted a piece of you tonight. I expected nothing less. I still waited, though – but here in the tub.”

She opened her eyes just enough to see him, and was immensely glad for doing so. His suit jacket was wrinkling; his tie in danger of falling into the water, but his attention was focused entirely on her and where his fingers traced her hairline. He looked tired, yet at peace; content. 

Rey remembered the first major events she had worked for him – The manic stress and almost debilitating exhaustion that would overtake him. Every single hour and day Rey had dedicated to the First Order; every single challenge and headache was all worth it to see him like this: Three years later, perfectly composed and at ease after the single biggest, most high-profile event of the entire year.

“Did you give them a good show?” she murmured, blinking at him and smiling slowly.

“Tried. It got hard towards the end. You’ll have to watch the press circuits back tomorrow and tell me.”

“Mhm. If it was anything like your concluding remarks, then I’m sure you did fine.”

“I have to confess to being a bit… distracted. The more time passed, the more impatient I got, thinking you had probably come back alone already…”

“You’re here now, and I’m not going anywhere.”

Kylo leaned over the tub to capture her lips. A moment later, his tie did indeed fall into the bath water, but he hardly noticed. 

 

Kylo came to join Rey at the window, a tumbler in his own hand. 

“Even the first time you worked Fashion Week with me, you didn’t show any interest in joining the parties,” he remarked, his eyes scanning the city at their feet. 

In his mind, his eyes recalled the first time Rey had come to Coruscant with him. The wonder in her eyes had been obvious, when they had entered the atmosphere and she’d seen the gleaming towers and palaces the first time. But while most of his staff had spilled out into the streets after the show wrapped, Rey had appeared in the door of his speeder to check on him. 

“I’m so used to sleeping here, a hotel suite would be too big and empty,” he’d said haltingly by way of explanation.

First, Rey had asked for his approval on the wrap-up instructions she’d prepared for staff team leaders. Then, once inside his ship, she’d wound up sitting. He had offered her a drink, she had accepted, and somehow they had resisted sleep together, talking until daybreak caught them off guard.

Rey remembered perfectly, smiling a little to herself but not sure what to say. She remembered finding him in his speeder; Remembered thinking how lonely it seemed, in the cold, shadowy ship that by necessity had become the closest thing he had to home comfort.

“Your first time on Coruscant, and during Fashion Week no less – And you wasted it talking to me all night,” Kylo said with a rueful smile and a sip from his glass. 

Rey took her time swirling her final sips of wine, then drank slowly. There were plenty of things she could have said:

Not once during that whole night had she wished she were at one of the parties – or anywhere else at all.

The more Kylo talked, the more relaxed and gentle he had become. Whenever Rey spoke, he listened with attentive patience she never would have expected him to possess in such abundance.

That night had been the first time she heard him laugh. The first time she’d seen the hint of his smile.

That night of Rey’s first Coruscant show two years ago was the night she had begun falling in love with him.

Six months later they had become lovers, yet even still there were thresholds they never crossed. It was a challenge for Kylo to speak even about the personal sentiments grounding his design work. Rey understood the blocks in his emotional expression, and so had never set foot in the space of voicing new feelings before he entered first.

He had yet to ever directly name his feelings for Rey. Rey didn’t waste too much concern over this fact. She was quite sure he made them perfectly clear in non-verbal ways. 

And so, all she said in reply to Kylo’s reminiscence was, “Believe me, I spent my first night on Coruscant exactly how I wanted to.”

She set her empty glass down on a small table near the window before turning closer to Kylo, skimming appreciative eyes over his bare chest. 

“I hope to repeat that habit tonight…”

Kylo didn’t immediately follow her to the sensual destination she hinted. Instead, his thoughts lingered over that first night spent in his speeder. 

The memory nudged insistently at strange, bold thoughts he’d been having all night; Since stepping onto the red carpet with Rey, since recognizing his crowning moment of achievement had come in that back stage corner – with the word ‘we’ followed by the taste of her lips – more precious than all the raving critics or sales revenue in the world; Since cutting off top fashion reporters still clamoring for more interviews, because he hated the thought of Rey alone, waiting up for him.

“Actually, there’s something I want to speak to you about.”

Quirking an eyebrow, Rey straightened up slightly where she stood. With a bit of effort, she pulled her gaze up from his bare chest to his face. Almost all levity fled from her when he saw his eyes; Gazing unseeingly through the window, with heavy introspection fixed somewhere far beyond the city bounds spread before them.

“That serious tone. If I didn’t know you’d fall apart without me, I’d be worried for my job.”

Kylo’s jaw worked, tasting and chewing words as he attempted to choose them.

“In a way, it is about your job…”

Then, it was Kylo’s turn to look at her and be taken aback by what he found. He blanched slightly at the open alarm now rising in her face.

“No, of course that’s not what I…,” he hurried to say, “I’m sorry, I’m already going about this all wrong.”

Truly puzzled now, Rey crossed her arms, narrowing her eyes slightly as she tried to read what struggle he was wrangling with. Kylo gave an extended sigh, rolling his shoulders and suddenly looking intensely frustrated with himself. He turned and walked a few paces away, where he set his glass down on the wood table at the foot of the bed. 

Rey could sense his nervous energy even across the room; Just as she could feel him valiantly trying to wrestle it all back under his control, in the extra minute he spent with his hand lingering over the glass, facing away from her. 

Rey was at a loss. Everything had gone brilliantly tonight, hadn’t it? Until now, he had seemed so pleased…

Kylo turned back to face her. He had called up his all-focus, no-nonsense business expression. But Rey noticed his fingertips twisting involuntarily against the fabric of his pants, betraying the ongoing simmer beneath the surface.

“Lately, I’ve had the growing feeling that it’s not right for me to be paying you like an employee. It’s not enough. All you do for me and for my work is far beyond what money can compensate.” He paused for a deep breath, his shoulders visibly rising and falling. Rey could see him sliding free of his business façade again, shifting gradually back into the untied, gentle Kylo she knew when he was alone with her.

He went on, his voice becoming warmer with each word, even while the formality he’d started with faded into a genuineness baring timidity. 

“More and more, I feel that you are half of all I do, and so you should be half of all I am. So, I want to ask if you would deign to consider becoming my partner.”

Rey didn’t react at first. Kylo was guarding his expression so carefully, he wasn’t giving her enough to understand. The silence stretched on like a physical thickness in the air, until Rey saw Kylo’s bottom lip disappear roughly between his teeth while his fingers knotted up at his sides: Sure-fire signs of intense anxiety. She was missing something…. Unless…

Unless.

Rey needed a split-second to remember how to speak.

“I-I think I’m misunderstanding… Is this to be a purely business partnership, or are you…” Gods, the word seemed ridiculous in her mind, too immense to ever fit between her lips, but she steeled herself and forced it out.

“… Proposing?”

An audible breath of relief escaped Kylo when _she said it_. His heart thudding in earnest now, he seized on the exhilaration of the moment, letting his over-thinking and second-guessing habits slip away.

“Yes. I am.”

He looked straight at Rey. He let the sight of her well up and fill him, along with the emotions she evoked in him. They were something he couldn’t control; Something that could make the whole world fall away – Make everything else stop existing outside of her. 

Right now, he let them carry him away entirely. 

“If you ever decide to work elsewhere or retire because the stress becomes too much… The thought of ever being without you is too terrible to dwell on. I don’t want to leave the future to chance. Besides, whatever empire I’ve built is only thanks to you. The First Order already owes its success to you, so I think it would only be right if…” 

In that instant, looking at her and the innumerable movements of feeling across her face was almost too much. But Kylo forced himself; She had shown him he was, in many ways, stronger than he knew. Of course he had the strength for this.

“If you became my wife.”

Rey’s lips clutched for air, as it all seemed to leave her lungs at once. It took a long moment to fully set in: That incredible, impossible, unthinkable prospect _had_ been what he meant… 

In all honesty, Rey had never imagined this. At least – never outside deep, half-forgotten dreams. Yet the reason was not because the idea had any effect less powerful on her than making time stop entirely.

The reason was because she had always imagined Kylo would view the idea as nothing but a frivolous extremity. Rey had thought she knew and understood his heart; That his passion for his work would always be the force grounding every element of his life in its tertiary orbit. Even if Kylo cared for her deeply and intensely, as she believed he did, the reason was grounded in Rey’s ability to elevate the reach and efficiency of his industry. 

Unquestionably, she had become more and more his partner, the more time they spent together. She had made him recognize employees were not dispensable commodities. She had broken him out of his reclusive self-isolation enough to understand that the whole world outside of himself was neither an enemy nor a hardship. 

The attraction that had grown between them was the most powerful thing Rey had ever known. Ever since the first time they became lovers, Rey had known she would spend the rest of her life being what he needed. She had always assumed he trusted her so deeply because he understood that.

But for her to have reoriented all the gravity and purpose in his world as equally radically? Rey had never imagined it. In the end, Rey thought they worked so well together because she fit into his world so seamlessly. Her talents and character had been the key the First Order lacked – Balancing Kylo’s volatility with her pragmatism and willingness to question him, when necessary. If he valued her, loved her even, it was because of the integral place she had taken in his success. 

Suddenly faced with rethinking everything she thought she understood and had come to accept about Kylo, Rey felt a growing streak of aggravation.

She had never pushed him about putting emotions to words. She had always held sentimentality back, even in the closest moments when she nearly wanted to weep with the longing to let the words free: Catching her breath in his arms after he had thoroughly unraveled her, then stitched her back together with attentive, gentle fingers and caresses in the aftershocks. 

Rey had avoided the area entirely, never wanting to make him uncomfortable. But now, he seemed to think he could skip verbalizations and declarations entirely? Instead, he thought he could simply pose the largest, most important of questions, while never bothering to show her how he had reached this conclusive and unexpected climax?

Rey shut her eyes. She could think just clearly enough to know she didn’t want to be angry with him. Not right now. But couldn’t he see the unfairness in his spontaneity? Couldn’t he see that she needed to hear what lay behind it?

Rey crossed the room with slow, measured steps to stand before him. Exhaling slowly, she lifted her hands to lay them against his chest. She did that quite a lot, but it came so naturally. Her head rose barely to his shoulder level, making his chest the neutral level where her eyes landed, and where her hands followed.

Not quite daring to look up into his face to see the consternation her silence was surely causing him, she fixed her gaze instead on her hands, resting against his bare skin. She found her eyes drawn to a small pattern of moles over his left pectoral, staring absently as if in attempt to see the heart beneath. 

“For the moment, I don’t care what’s right or proper in terms of whatever empire we’ve built or how successful the First Order has become. Kylo, I have to be clear about what you feel for me, separate from revenues or trend reaches or any of that.”

Rey could feel his gaze boring into her, could almost sense how intensely he hung on every word she spoke. His heartbeat had grown erratic under her touch; Terrified of what she would say, yet determined to understand.

“There is only one reason why I would marry you. You’ve gotten close, but I’m not sure you really see what’s missing. The thing is, I can’t even say for sure whether we’re actually missing it or not, but the fact that I’m not sure… that you’ve never said…”

Rey knew she would have to be the one to jump first. He had raised this massive, daunting subject, and yet she was still the one who would first have to speak the biggest, most dangerous words in the galaxy… Rey felt a small stab of disappointment, but decided the stakes were bigger and worth taking the risk.

She cleared her throat, doing her absolute best not to let her voice lapse into that small, timid quiver it had a frustrating habit of doing when Kylo was near.

“The only reason that I would marry you, no matter whether we’re here in this hotel suite or penniless in the Outer Rim, is because I’m in love with you and you feel the same.”

Now, it was Rey’s turn to dread the silence. Sure enough, her words met a long, quivering stillness that settled around them both with frightening, dizzying weight.

When Kylo finally uncovered his voice again, it was to ask with a spellbound, confounded strain,

“You’re… in love with me?”

The only reaction Rey could give was an abrupt, disbelieving laugh, unable to hold it back at the almost ludicrous nature of the situation. Kylo had proposed marriage to her, and a minute later greeted the fact that Rey loved him as a revelation straining belief.

Rey choked back mirth. 

“Kylo. I’ve dedicated my whole life to you and incase you haven’t noticed, I don’t even like fashion all that much!”

When Rey looked up and saw the utter shock frozen across Kylo’s face, she sobered, wondering for an instant whether she had crossed a line too far. For half a second, she expected him to announce he was withdrawing the whole ‘partnership’ offer, (whatever he had even really meant by it, because Rey was still maddeningly unclear on it all) because he could never partner with someone who didn’t appreciate fashion ‘all that much.’

Instead, Rey saw every trace of his self-possession and stoicism collapse and abandon him. Not only in the eruption of tender fervor that consumed his features, but in the way his frame buckled inward like strings had been cut. He nearly stumbled in the half step it took to close the space between them. With a wholly uncharacteristic, imprecise jerk, his hands rushed to cup Rey’s face. His thumbs rubbed over her cheeks as if gathering physical proof of her existence.

Rey found her own breath quickening to match the pace of his. She had never seen anything like the bright intensity of his eyes in that moment. She had watched his face alight at the sight of his newest creations finding their perfect fit and long thought she would never see a purer form of joy or fulfillment. 

She’d been wrong. She’d never seen such light flooding him before, streaming out from inside of him. 

Kylo wet his lips and murmured with difficulty, “I never really gave you a chance, did I? To say why you’ve stayed with me all this time. Even when I was short-tempered, arrogant, foolish…” He gave a short, wet laugh. “I’ve been quite foolish tonight, haven’t I?”

Rey instinctively clutched at him, one hand landing on his outstretched arm, the other at his waist to hold him in place.

“No, no you haven’t. Just… surprising. You caught me entirely off guard. But…” She skimmed one hand up his arm to grip his wrist. “In a good way. The best.”

Rey watched his throat tense and his jaw work, watched him wrangle desperately with all he wanted to express. He was trying with everything in him, and paired with the way his fingers trembled slightly against her jaw, she felt nothing but the strongest affection surge through her. He _did_ want to tell her, desperately, the very importance of it tripping his speech in loops he kept dismissing for inadequate. 

In second-nature, Rey did what she was always best at: She helped him.

“I’ve never done this job for the clothes, the art, or the success.” Rey’s thumb stroked across Kylo’s inner wrist. “I only ever did it for you. So you would be happier.”

A gasping laugh broke from Kylo, now mingled with the hint of tears. He released her face in favor of gathering her close in a messy rush, tucking her entirely beneath his chin. 

And then, feeling her warmth surrounding him, coursing through him with breathtaking heat – Then the words came easily. 

“You are everything to me, Rey. Everything. If I never sell another piece, never design again… it wouldn’t matter. You’ve made me happier than anything else ever could. Did you know, the first time we made love… I couldn’t work for a week. Everything else was so… ugly, so meaningless compared to you, and at first I didn’t know how to process the reality that clothes never actually brought me fulfillment that mattered. But as long as you’re here with me… You give meaning and purpose to everything else.” 

Kylo closed his eyes, bending his head to press his lips against her hair. He breathed in her soap, shampoo, but sweetest of all, the scent of her that was always the last thing he reached for before sleep.

He remembered empty beds, empty offices, an empty life before her. But Rey, solid and present and unfailingly kind, banished the constant specters of solitude and inadequacy. Now, with the idea finally speakable – _possible_ – of her spending her life with him, untethered to jobs or business that might one day pull her from his side… He didn’t want to stop speaking; The floodgates teemed with all of the new potencies she awakened in his heart.

“You are my greatest inspiration and my greatest joy. Before you, I thought designing was the only means I had to find expression and understanding... But you've made the world no longer a place that needs escaping. Now, when I design, it's a celebration of everything you’ve brought into my life. It all comes from you, Rey."

And then, he finally came to it. It slid from his tongue more easily than he ever expected. 

“My love for you. I’ve long accepted that nothing will ever fully capture it, but still, I can’t seem to stop trying.”

Rey jolted against him, pulling back just enough to look up into his face. The blinding, trembling smile she gave him made his heart flip with relief and joy. He had finally opened up enough to show her the truth. In tiny cracks between his elation that her truth was the same as his, he felt foolish that he’d feared this for so long.

His world shrunk down to her face close before his, her saccharine lips only breaths away.

She beat him to it. Rey threw her arms around his neck with jubilance and pulled herself up to kiss him energetically. As Kylo responded with every bit of the same energy, his arms tightened to scoop her up from the floor that little bit so she would be even closer, his lips embracing hers more tightly. 

“What does this mean?” Rey asked breathlessly when they finally parted. She was smiling like sadness had never existed in the world, her hands alternating between touching Kylo’s face and pushing through his hair. 

Kylo considered, his brain working at a slower pace after their extended kiss and the sight of her glowing so bright with joy _he_ had brought her.

“I think it means that we’ll keep dominating the fashion industry for as long as it remains entertaining. Then, some day in the future we’ll leave the First Order to operate independently, and we’ll go off on our own to enjoy the one thing that makes us truly happy.”

“You’re really sure? The First Order has hit market dominance nearly everywhere and you built all that. I plan and organize, sure, but your design work is what people across countless star systems flock to buy. No one else could ever challenge you.”

Kylo curled a lock of Rey’s hair around his finger, watching it with a contented, far-off look. 

“If you decide to say yes - no matter today, next week, or years from now – then I am entirely sure.” A smile erupted across his face, while he bit his lip as if at a private joke. “Don’t you see the irony, Rey? You’ve made me more successful than I ever could have been alone. But now, the success means so little. Compared with the marvel of you somehow, for some reason, enjoying spending so much time in my company…”

He stroked over her hair with gentleness befitting a holy relic, like she was something he almost didn’t dare to touch directly.

“Why spend the rest of my life channeling my feelings for you into design work, when I could just spend my life with you?”

“Then why are you still using the word ‘if’?” Rey whispered. It was taking a lot to process the full meaning of everything Kylo was saying: That in his world, she’d never been secondary to anything. That his love for her guided all else. That he would, some day, gladly leave his empire behind if she was what lay ahead. 

But Rey could think perfectly clearly about one thing – The one fact most important in all of this…

To Kylo’s slight look of confusion, she clarified, “You said ‘if I say yes’.” 

His gaze softened instantly and infinitely. The hand that had gravitated to rest on her hip tightened reflexively. He thought he could sense what she was about to say, and yet at the same time didn’t dare to assume something so immense…

“Kylo. Yes. I will marry you. I will.”

On their face, the words were simple, short, and direct. But Rey could see Kylo absorbing them slowly, their full meaning washing over him only gradually.

Unable to stop herself from grinning, she couldn’t quite give him time to catch up. 

“I’ve known for a long time already that I wanted to spend my life with you, and I would have been happy to do so as your PA. If you ever tried to fire me for some reason, I didn’t plan on letting you. But now you know the reason why I’ve worked so hard, why I was happy to let this job consume my whole life. Well, it’s because you did…”

He had finally caught up. His mouth opened and closed silently several times. His entire jaw trembled, while the emotion in his eyes looked dangerously near the point of overflow. He could manage nothing but a whisper, still stalled in the phase of disbelief.

“I don’t deserve you… Not as my assistant, certainly not as my wife…”

Hearing that word from his lips made Rey’s chest feel as if it might suddenly leap into flight. Biting back a smile so wide it threatened to burst, Rey brushed her fingertips over Kylo’s lips.

“Shh. I can make that determination for myself. Do you think I would ever have wasted my time, if I hadn’t seen something precious under all your defenses and dramatics?”

Although Rey usually took pleasure in his towering height, right now she found the space between their statures wholly unacceptable. She looped her arms around his neck, drawing him down and out from his reticent amazement. His hands tightened at her waist. When her nose brushed his, he trembled as she passed breath from her own lips to his. 

Rey could feel all of him quaking slightly against her; His fingers clutching her closer like a lifeline, the pulse of his heart hammering against her own chest. He was struggling to hold himself together. Whether from lingering disbelief or overwhelming happiness, Rey couldn’t be sure. But she didn’t want to leave a shred of doubt in him.

“Nothing would make me happier than becoming your wife. Now that you’ve finally helped me understand…”

Kylo kissed her lips - in the center, then each corner. Then her cheeks. 

“I’m sorry,” he whispered against her skin, into the soft, fluttering kisses. “Sorry you thought for even a moment that there could be anything in my life more important than you. When really, nothing would make sense without you…”

“You’re going to have the rest of our lives together to show me.”

Her fingers sinking into his hair, Rey pulled his mouth back to hers. She kissed him deeply and greedily. Now that they were finally converging on complete mutual understanding at a level more intense than ever before, Rey felt hungry passion beginning to kindle deep inside of her. Feeling like she’d finally been granted complete access to the most closely guarded parts of him, she wanted to experience the same total access to him physically – in every intimate way she could.

Kylo had always been a passionate lover, but Rey sensed that he would be different, now that they had expressed in words the endearments and promises they had long traded between their bodies.

“How about starting tonight?” Rey panted against his open mouth. 

“I would be only too happy.”

His fingers clenching at the small of her back, his breathing growing heavier against her open lips – Kylo envisioned spreading Rey in the massive bed and lavishing worship upon every inch of her. He thought one by one of her most sensitive places. For the first time, in addition to the veneration of his fingers, his tongue, or his cock, he would deposit words of love and promises of forever in the secret corners of her skin and the delirious places between her legs.

Her mouth already working at his, Rey’s fingers roughly pulled the tie of her robe open. Kylo’s wide hands pushed the fabric off her shoulders. As soon as it hit the floor, Rey pressed herself close against him, hands tangling in his hair and her tongue finding his again while one of her legs hooked over his hip. Kylo’s hands swept down her bare back, quickly lifting her up against him. 

How he loved being the force stronger than gravity to her. And Rey never tired of how effortlessly he could sweep her up – His body and strength providing all the grounding she would ever need.

The bed sheets were the finest quality money could buy. They brushed butter-soft against Rey’s skin when Kylo laid her back and watched her hungrily for the too-long moment it took him to shed his pants. 

As his hands danced down her body, stroking and briefly lingering in all the right places, Rey was already at risk of losing herself. Then, as she had hoped, he did indeed do something new.

“My Rey.” He painted the words between her breasts on his way down her body. 

“My love.” These words brushed into her navel, while his hands gently opened her thighs. They parted all too willingly for him. His hands mapped their way along the soft skin of her inner thighs while his tongue dipped into her belly button. 

He shifted down those last few inches to the space he loved most; Where he could, with effort and tenacity, do his best to bring her to an immaculate world of bliss that was even still only a taste of the paradise he found in her.

“My life,” he murmured like a prayer against her clit before his mouth went to task. 

Rey threw her head back in the pillows, one hand twisting in the sheets while the other knotted into his hair. She had never fathomed his talent for this, but now, knowing the true magnitude of his feelings, she at least understood the source of his fervency.

Then, once she had grown flushed and hard enough, Kylo’s lips sealed around her and _sucked_ , and Rey understood nothing any more. Not even the cry that had escaped her own lips: Only mind and body-numbing pleasure.

Kylo tilted her hips upward, settling her legs open at a wider angle over his shoulders so he could work his way in more deeply. She tugged hard on his hair as he sucked at a new angle, and the stab of his own arousal almost choked him. He pulled back for a moment to catch his breath, savoring her taste, her wetness on his lips. 

Eager to go on, Kylo used his tongue to spread her wetness. He felt the rumbling vibrations of her soft moans, as his ministrations elevated the hot, throbbing pressure building in her and her arousal began flowing in earnest. 

“My everything,” he whispered into her depths, just loud enough to reach her ears. Then he tipped her thighs wide to the proper angle, and sank his tongue far enough inside her to make her cry out his name.

He used the fingers of one hand to spread her farther open, his head tilting so he could lap up and devour her at every possible angle. She was sickeningly sweet inside, sweet enough to make his teeth ache and his thoughts lose coherence – and yet he could never get enough. His lips pressed flat against her, his tongue pushed as deep as he could possibly reach to gather and consume every bit of her he could. With each thrust he sought more – To discover and claim all the secret, forbidden riches within her. 

Her thighs trembling on each side of his neck, he listened closely to her panting for breath while he swept his tongue in circles inside her. Feeling her inner muscles quivering under the press of his tongue made his whole head ignite in inchoate fireworks.

Rey bucked beneath him, letting out a deep moan at the same moment his own pleasure spiked. Only the most primal, powerful instinct guided him through the intoxication.

Kylo shifted his shoulders up, making Rey’s knees bend to a higher angle. She began begging in nonsensical words above him, her fingers shakily stroking and clutching in his hair. She knew what he was searching for within her, and every second waiting for it was like torture.

Bracketing her slim hips, Kylo’s hands pulled her down towards him slightly. He tipped her hips up higher while his mouth worked her open wider. When he thought he felt her finally relaxed and unlocked enough to his incursion, he began a single-minded search for the single point that unleashed her at her most extraordinary.

Tipping her knees up a final inch, he pressed his tongue hard upward. He reached in a bit farther, breathing in the heady scent of her all around him, and pressed up again. His hands tilting her towards his mouth like the first taste of water in a desert, his tongue swept hard upwards one more time…

A scream escaped Rey. Kylo had to anchor her in place with his hands as she fought to buck and writhe beneath him. His tongue probed at that deep wellspring again, and she pulled his hair so hard he saw spots – though he couldn’t say for sure they weren’t also a product of his own onrushing pinnacle.

It was just like crafting the most beautiful gown in all of existence – And at the same time so many worlds beyond the realm of all material possibility. She defied measurement, and he discarded all method. There was only the total abolishment of all existence outside the two of them as one. Rey couldn’t remember what she had been before this, before the power and fire engulfing her. For Kylo, the world inside of Rey’s body became the only reality that mattered. He drew each shuddering breath, each overwhelming rush of sensation, and each pounding heartbeat from that small spot deep within her.

She fisted both hands in his hair as if she could pull him deeper within herself. She sweat and trembled, moaning and whimpering in turns as Kylo’s tongue caressed her deepest, most intense vulnerability. Drinking in the direct line of her sensations, he probed the line that threatened to burn her alive.

Before she realized she had cried out, Rey was falling faster and harder than she could comprehend. Kylo couldn’t think for a blinding moment, as she seized and tightened convulsively against his mouth and the ground fell out from under him.

Panting against her, he became slowly aware of the sheets wet beneath him. Then in the next instant he forgot, because he realized his face was wet from _her_.

Kylo had to shut his eyes for a split second, choking back a broken moan. Even when it threatened to hurt, he always wanted more of her.

He made a concerted effort to loosen his grip on her. Listening to her panting above him, Kylo lowered her hips slowly back to the bed. But even while he eased her down to let her recover, he couldn’t lift his head away yet. He let her knees settle against his back while her thighs rested open for him still. 

She murmured his name once she had recovered enough breath for speech, her fingers loosening in his hair. With almost apologetic gentleness, she stroked his hair back from his face. But Kylo hadn’t quite come back to full coherency yet. He couldn’t stop his tongue from gathering the drops of her release that had gathered in the corner of his lips.

He appealed in a gritty whisper, “Can I drink you clean?”

Rey shuddered, half at his words and half at his tone. Her breathing hitched up half a click again. She knew she didn’t have the stamina to climb to any height again so soon, but there was nothing she treasured more than Kylo’s gentle, intimate love.

(For she, at some level, had always known that was what it was – Regardless of its reasoning.)

Rey nodded, but whispered to him, “Just don’t go inside again so soon.”

Kylo laid his hand along Rey’s thigh, stroking circles with his thumb. He bent his head to place a careful, open-mouthed kiss over her entrance. He withdrew quickly when she shivered, heat tickling along his chest at the way she gasped his name. 

With infinite gentleness, he began to lap away the residue of her climax. He swiped his tongue in search of each sweet drop, making a slow path up and around her clit. Rey sucked breath through her teeth when Kylo’s tongue swiped across once. 

Once he was satisfied with his work, Kylo finally pulled back enough to let air flow in between them. Yet even now, at the point of stimulation exhaustion, Rey wasn’t sure she wanted anything at all between them ever again.

Still floating in some higher plane devoted to her, Kylo brushed a final soft kiss between her legs before pulling away. Disentangling himself from her thighs, he retraced his path up her navel. He took a brief detour to lay an open kiss on one of her nipples, then another of equal tenderness at her other breast. When he finally, _finally_ made his way up to see her eyes, Rey’s were wet and her body was threatening to shake apart. 

Rey turned into his chest, curling in tight against him and hiding her face against his neck. When he cradled her close, the gasping whisper escaped her, “I love you. I love you, Kylo.”

Kylo had been so sure there could be nothing more powerful, more significant than lovemaking with Rey.

But then, impossibly, there came this. 

In the moments while his lungs grappled for sustenance and he fought to hold his heart in place, he reached to pull the sheets up over Rey. As he folded her back into his arms, he struggled with all he wanted to say to her. All the languages and words in the galaxy were not enough. 

He laid his lips against her forehead. He closed his eyes and stopped thinking – just feeling her in his arms like a personal sun issuing light and gravity. 

“For a long time, I was convinced this industry – this world – was meant for me alone. That I could only succeed alone, and success by definition was a solitary achievement. I understood so little. It was no fulfillment at all. The marvel of waking up and falling asleep next to you every day… I know I’ll never be worthy, and yet I don’t know how I could survive without it. Now that I’ve known what it is to love you…”

Rey made a soft noise against his shoulder, pulling back just enough to smile at him with wobbly understanding that tugged Kylo’s heart loose entirely. 

“I can’t live with anything less,” she finished for him. 

 

The first light of morning stole into the room as they laid twined together, finally drifting towards sleep. A stray remembrance slipped into Rey’s mind. Smiling to herself slightly, she gave Kylo a slight nudge.

“Want to know a secret I’ve always been a bit afraid to tell you?”

Kylo made a soft noise of assent – A rumble Rey felt more than heard, where her head pillowed against his chest. 

“You should probably know before you marry me… Remember when I did a modification repair without permission on one of your dresses, during the show on Jakku when we met?”

“Mm. Tangerine. Black accent.”

Rey bit her lip. “I didn’t mean for the thread to be black. It was just the first color I grabbed.”

Kylo took a moment. Then his eyes opened in a flash. He sat up so quickly, he dislodged Rey from his chest. 

“Are you being serious?” His eyes were wide enough to make Rey fret for a second that this might actually matter.

“Completely. I didn’t even think about what the hell worked with _tangerine._ ” 

She waved her hands in a silly flutter as she emphasized the color with every bit of the pretention it deserved. Then she cocked an eyebrow at Kylo in an inquisitive, slightly challenging tilt. 

He just stared at her for a long moment before speaking.

“I am… terribly in love with you. I think I have been since that very moment.”

Rey laughed, rolling her eyes at him in a way nothing short of adoring.

“Is it so terrible, being in love with me?” she asked as he laid back again and she settled back into her place against him.

“The worst. Nigh unbearable,” he replied, his fingers stroking through her hair where her heard rested against his shoulder.

“I think I’m worse off between the two of us. I’m in love with someone who uses the word ‘nigh’.”

“Ah. I may sound pompous sometimes, but at least _I_ know what colors complement tangerine.”

“Yeah – Black. May I remind you, you learned from me.”

A chuckle escaped Kylo despite himself. He did his best to strike a serious tone.

“I rescind my proposal. I don’t know how I could ever live with you and your disrespect.” 

“You’d better un-rescind it, and quickly. We both know the only thing worse for you than living with me is living without me.”

Kylo turned towards her under the blankets, smiling into her hair. He slid her closer to him, right up against his heart.

“That’s only too true.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope these four chapters have made an enjoyable read! Goodness knows I loved every second of writing them, and it just got better and better the more this version of a Reylo union grew and took over my mind. I would love to hear in the comments if this AU grew on you the same way it did to me! It's really become quite close to my heart :')
> 
> New ideas appear on the daily for further scenes I'd like to explore:  
> -Kylo extremely awkwardly announcing to the FO that he and Rey are planning to marry, so everyone will have a month's vacation while they're gone. No one believes him until Rey pipes up, "No, he's being serious!"  
> -Rey wants to meet Kylo's parents since she never had a family of her own. Kylo hasn't spoken to them in over a decade, but considers trying for her.  
> -The wedding dress Kylo makes for Rey. When he sees her in it on their wedding day, he breaks down in tears.
> 
> It would give me so much life to hear anyone else's further scene ideas in the comments!! I live for writing these two so I would love added motivation to keep on doing so! :)


	5. One Week

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So I watched the film Paterson, and then I had no choice really but to write a week of morning scenes for my favorite AU-verse couple. Look at this beautiful, wholesome inspiration: http://xoruffitup.tumblr.com/post/171672387455/domhnall-tonal-patersons-morning-kisses
> 
> For timeline clarification: I envision this taking place between chapters 3 and 4 - so before Voicing Feelings became a thing.

Monday

"Wake up! Come on, Kylo, get up. The Senate emissaries will be here in half an hour!"

Kylo groaned from the bed and rolled over onto his front, as if hiding his face in the pillows would block out Rey's voice.

"Caf is ready!" Rey chirped, darting back and forth through the room as she gathered together all the documents and contracts Kylo would need for the meeting. When he still hadn't moved by her next passing beside the bed, she reached down to give one of his ankles a brief tug. "I'm serious. If you stay in bed any longer, you won't have time to do your hair."

"Cancel the meeting, then. Better to make no appearance than one where I don't look my best."

Rey barely made out his words with his mouth still partially obscured by the pillow, but shook her head in amusement.

"No such luck. This is a Senate delegation, not reporters or a rival company. You could show up in a jumpsuit and they wouldn't notice."

Rey was gratified to see Kylo finally sit up, his brow turned down in abject distaste as he repeated the word "jumpsuit" in disgust.

Rey bustled out to the kitchen, packing up her briefcase before going to pour out some caf. For the past week, their calendars had enjoyed a brief respite from shows or appearances demanding travel, allowing them to stay for some extended time in Kylo's quarters on the Supremacy. Modestly sized but fully furnished, they were a welcome change from cramped single bedrooms in speeders and ever-cycling hotel rooms.

Rey carried the steaming mug into the bedroom. Kylo stood before the open doors of his massive closet, his fingers closing the buttons of a black silk shirt. He looked up and took the cup when Rey approached.

"Remember, the Senate's not happy that we expanded operations into the Illenium system. Apparently we're already pressing the limits of monopoly regulations."

One of Kylo's shoulders lifted in an indifferent shrug, while he tilted his head back to quickly drain the cup. Rey took back the emptied cup without batting an eyelash, too long accustomed to Kylo's abundant caf consumption to be surprised.

"So tell me how I explain diplomatically that fashion doesn't work by regulations? Where there is demand for my designs - which would be everywhere - I supply them. How do politicians fancy to have a say?" Kylo half disappeared into the closet while he spoke, flicking through hangers in search of the correct cloak to match today's silk shirt-leather trousers palette.

Rey replied regardless. "Because your clothing is expensive, and our sales will be a considerable movement of goods and wealth in and out of the system. The Senate has to keep tabs on these things - For tax purposes and such. And, to make sure our market and revenue expansions don't affect local economies, trade, wages and so on." She sighed. "You didn't read any of the briefings, did you?"

“No. But you did. And I only need the summary, anyway.”

He emerged from the depths of his closet with a cloak folded over one arm and the trace of a teasing smirk on his mouth. 

Rey rolled her eyes. “I ought to let you crash and burn. Bedhead and all.”

“You wouldn’t dare.”

“Try me.”

He stepped towards her in the same moment she leaned forward. Kylo’s hand cupped the back of her neck to angle her head just right when they met for a belated, lingering morning kiss. 

“You’ve got five minutes to fix your hair.” Rey reached up to muss the dark hair falling over his forehead before he bustled on to the bathroom. 

“More than I need.”

 

Tuesday

Rey came awake at an odd hour. Blinking groggily at the digital clock display, she realized she didn't hear Kylo breathing beside her.

She took a moment to remember where she had left him the night before, then gave a long sigh as she scooted to the edge of the bed.

Shivering a bit, she wrapped her arms around herself as she walked down the short hallway leading to the Kylo's smaller studio. (His larger one where most of his work was done, and which Rey's full office was adjoined to, was several floors above them). Sure enough, she found him just where she expected.

As if five hours hadn't passed, Kylo still sat hunched over his workspace. Drawings, tables, and sketches were spread out across the table, while mock-up fitting projections rotated in a holographic display in front of him. His head was propped against one hand, his eyes glazed over yet stubborn determination still hardening the line of his mouth.

"Kylo," Rey spoke softly from the doorway, her voice still sleep-rough. He sat up quickly, straightening as he turned towards her. He blinked quickly to clear and focus his gaze, making a futile effort to hide the weary shadow over his face. "Don't sit here all night again. You never finish whatever it is you want to finish and then you're just grumpy the next day."

"But there's just one last thing missing and I'm so close..."

"Please, save it for tomorrow when you can think clearly."

Rey uncrossed one arm to hold her hand out to him.

"Come to bed."

In his slightly bleary-eyed state, Kylo spent a long moment taking Rey in. She leaned against one side of the doorway, looking small as she huddled inward slightly after leaving the warmth of their bed. The wide neck of her oversized sleep shirt slipped down one shoulder, the bottom falling unevenly across her bare thighs. (She refused designer pajamas on principle.) He looked at her pillow-ruffled hair, the sleepy droop of her eyelids, then finally at her hand open and extended towards him. Kylo's protests slowly ebbed away.

"Okay. Tomorrow." Kylo waved his hand to shut down the holograph projector. Then he rose and came to take Rey's hand. As she led the way to the bedroom, he shut the lights off as they went.

He didn't bother with changing, just stripped down to underwear before sliding into his side of the bed and meeting Rey in the middle. Curving himself around the shape of her back, one arm curled over her, Kylo took a deep, calming breath in and out against the nape of Rey's neck. Slowly relaxing, her warmth gradually permeating him and her scent wrapping around him, he felt tension unspooling and escaping from places he hadn't even realized it lived.

"Really, I was close," he mumbled clumsily against her skin.

She hummed, eyes locked closed. Rey pressed back into him slightly, reveling in the added comfort he brought to the bed. "'M sure you were."

Kylo settled his head down against the pillow. Eyes closed, he thought only of Rey's warm, summer spice scent. In the moment before he was lulled to sleep, he thought distantly: Nothing was missing. He'd gotten there after all.

 

Wednesday

Rey didn't linger in bed. Kylo was jostled awake by her sharp movements as she got up. Rey moved things around loudly beside the bed, her mouth pinched as she stomped out towards the kitchen. Sitting up, Kylo rubbed his hands over his face. He sat unmoving and pensive during the minutes Rey puttered around the kitchen, his legs drawn up in front of him under the sheets and arms draped across his knees.

"I'm sorry," he offered when she passed on her way to the bathroom, pointedly not looking at him.

"You don't even know what you're apologizing for."

"For snapping at that reporter yesterday, and then leaving you in the uncomfortable situation of cleaning up after me."

Rey sighed deeply, but Kylo's response was thoughtful enough for Rey to at least halt her march through the bedroom and give him a chance.

"I just can't believe you rose to his bait." Rey shook her head, a sour expression still pulling at her features. Her gaze stayed glued to the wall, rather than roaming towards the bed where Kylo watched her with plaintive eyes. "You know reporters from that news outlet are just sensationalists. They'll do anything to get a rise out of you, so they can make it a headline joke on next week's transmissions. You don’t have to take everything quite so seriously. Sometimes you make problems where there are none, and yes, then it makes my job a lot harder when I have to clean up your PR."

Kylo took a long moment silently sampling responses on his tongue, trying to gauge and measure each instinct yearning for voice.

"Sometimes it's... difficult not to take each little comment seriously – When I feel that I, my work, and my reputation are all one in the same. It’s not only words to me."

Rey's mood softened - as it almost always did in the rare moments when Kylo unwrapped his shell a bit.

She came over to sit on the edge of the bed, though still didn’t quite look at him.

"Your work is the best,” she said, speaking sincerely and more gently now. She leaned forward, her head tilted towards the floor as she spoke carefully, “Everyone knows that - even the gossip journals who make things up. Especially them. They don't know any other way to try to process genius like yours. There will always be petty media commentary, but that's just a part of leading the industry that you'll have to learn to accept. All in all, don't you think it's a small price to pay?"

His elbows still propped against his knees, Kylo considered, his eyes on Rey in a distant, thoughtful way. He shifted to drag a hand through his hair. Then he alighted on one single part of Rey's comments - Probably not her main point, but a standout component to him nonetheless.

"Do you really think I'm a genius?"

Rey rolled her eyes, getting up from the bed but unable to suppress a snort of disbelief. "Goodness, no. You're an ass who thinks far too highly of himself, except for the occasions when someone insults him and he becomes much too over-sensitive. Exhausting, that's what you are. And completely missing the point."

Rey turned and marched into the bathroom, though not quite stomping anymore. Kylo supposed that was some progress. Plus, the fact that she’d called him an ass was actually a good sign – She never called him names when she was truly angry with him.

He thought more over what she’d said, as he stood before his closet getting dressed.

Did his quick defensiveness find injury where there was none? Did his own reactions create foes that were really no more than shadows?

Kylo was still mulling such questions over when he came into the bathroom to examine the state of his hair. While he combed, tousled, and started rubbing product in, Rey leaned towards the mirror over the second sink beside him, dabbing a light layer of makeup around her eyes.

They stood side-by-side quietly for almost a minute, each absorbed in their respective morning routines, before Kylo’s gaze finally sought out hers in the mirror.

"I am sorry for causing problems for you yesterday,” his tone was earnest; unfamiliar in the tentative apology. “You’re right – It would have been a lot better to just let him ask his silly questions.”

“That’s for sure.” Rey’s voice was markedly lighter already.

“I'll...try to think more rationally next time instead of losing my temper."

Rey turned towards him now, leaning sideways against the sink with her arms crossed. She fixed him with a look that was half disbelieving, half challenging amusement.

“I’ve come to accept that the temper is just part of your package. But I appreciate the effort.”

Kylo had to turn towards her as well - He in slight indignation.

“So you think I’m hopeless, do you?”

“No, hardly.” 

At this point, Rey had to give in. Force knew she could get terribly, boiling angry with him sometimes. During her first month working for Kylo, there had been occasional moments when she questioned whether she would be able to tolerate him. But they had all been short-lived. Something had always cooled her anger, tempered her frustration with him, and left her wanting to help him fix whatever had gone wrong – whatever had made him lose his composure – and any thought of abandoning him quickly became impossible. 

In truth, he’d made great steps. His much-feared tantrums had become a thing of the past (to the great relief of his staff), and Rey had far fewer messes to clean up these days.

Once her frustration with him ebbed away, it always left something warm and tender in its wake. It had taken a while for Rey to identify her feelings for what they were, but the puzzling truth was: Each over-reaction or misjudgment Rey had helped Kylo through left her only more devoted and hopeful.

Rey had long since stopped trying to find the logic in such emotions, and simply embraced them as they were.

She reached up for his shoulders as she stepped to close the gap between them. Her hands linking behind his neck, she let her fingertips toy with his freshly styled hair.

“If I did think that, I would have left a long time ago.”

One of his hands reached up to wipe away a stray smudge of makeup tint under one of her eyes. 

“Sometimes I’m amazed you haven’t already.”

His voice came out even and impassive, but Rey was standing close enough to see the quaking depths in his eyes, and knew better.

“Don’t say that. I’m not going anywhere.”

Rey leaned in and kissed him deeply – She hoped heartfelt and lingering enough to demonstrate. When Kylo’s hand moved to cup Rey’s jaw, it shook slightly.

 

Thursday

Kylo came into the kitchen yawning, to find Rey going over a spread of papers at the kitchen table.

"You didn't get me up," he observed blearily, blinking slowly between her and the pot of caf on the counter.

Rey shook her hair from her face as she tilted back in her chair to look at him.

"Your first meeting isn't for another two hours. You've been up late so many nights this week, I figured you could use some extra rest."

Kylo made only a vague noise in response - not exactly one of agreement. The new designs he'd been pouring over every free minute of the day had to be completed by the month's end, and they still needed a lot of work.

But for now - caf. Rey turned her attention back to her papers while Kylo propped himself up in the small kitchen's corner, leaning back against the counter. While he cupped the hot cup between both hands and drained half, his gaze fell on Rey and stayed there.

She was almost entirely curled up in the chair, sitting on one leg with her other bent and doubled up, foot resting on the chair's seat. She muttered to herself as she flipped through some of the papers. Kylo guessed they were probably the contracts for the new line he hoped to complete this month. Squinting at fine print, she absent-mindedly brought the end of her pen between her lips and chewed it for a moment. Kylo smiled into his cup unconsciously.

Kylo hardly made a habit of seeing people in their sleep clothes, but being the overly critical perfectionist he was, one would have thought he'd doubtless find plenty to critique. But Kylo wasn't thinking about the mournful lack of silk nightshirts in Rey's wardrobe. He didn't even take notice that her leggings were the same battered, threadbare pair she loved and practically lived in, in defiant indifference to his frequent complaints against them.

Kylo didn't realize he'd been standing there holding an empty cup, until Rey finally sensed his gaze and turned towards him. Her raised eyebrows suggested she also expected Kylo’s thoughts to have turned toward their naturally critical ways.

"Why are you staring? What is it?"

"Nothing," he replied immediately, but in a slow, soft tone that gave Rey pause. It seemed to take effort for Kylo to push himself away from the counter and take the few steps to deposit his empty cup in the sink.

"I'll be in the studio. Get me for my first meeting."

He passed a hand along Rey's shoulders as he crossed the room behind her chair. Rey didn't reply, just turned her head to watch him go. Her gaze lingered in the empty doorway for a long moment after he'd gone, silently translating. When she finally turned back to the contracts, it was with a softly glowing smile.

Turning lights on in the smaller of his studios, Kylo wondered if Rey had heard what he'd really said in the kitchen.

_You look beautiful this morning._

Sitting down at the wide desk, he asked himself why he hadn't said it plainly. They'd been lovers for well over a year now, and knew each other in all the most intimate of ways. Yet, this particular form of externalized, professed intimacy still sometimes confounded him.

Ten minutes later, he was still thinking of Rey instead of all the designs needing finishing.

Next time, he would say it.

 

Friday

Kylo's waking instinct to turn and reach across the bed encountered only cold sheets. Waking gradually, he blinked slowly several times at the expanse of empty bed beside him. When his remembrance clicked in, he rolled onto his back with a sigh, his fruitlessly searching hand splayed on the pillows.

Rey had taken her speeder the day before to respond to delays reported at one of his largest production facilities several worlds away. The size of whatever problem she encountered aside, the length of the journey alone already meant she'd be gone a day at least.

In a stubborn, disappointed mood, Kylo considered skipping his first meeting of the day. Part of him simply wanted to stay here in bed, not feeling particularly energized. But the bed lacked its most distinctive feature, and staying here longer would likely only make him further resentful of its absence. Plus, Rey's disapproving face swam into his mind, chiding him for slacking off. 

"I swear, I leave you alone for one day and you can't do a thing."

Finally, Kylo managed the hint of a smile as he got up.

 

Saturday

Rey woke to soft kisses trailing down her side. Her eyes still closed but her lips lilting upwards in a honeyed smile, she made a deep humming sound to accompany her slow, pleasant rise to wakefulness.

"Morning," Kylo murmured against her hip. Rey lay on her side, while Kylo shifted behind her, tracing the curves and dips of her body.

A few minutes before, Kylo had drifted awake with Rey spooned perfectly against him. The curve of her back to his front had been so seamless, the warmth of her so soothing and all encompassing, Kylo had simply drifted in contented comfort.

Then, he'd become slowly aware of where his hand splayed against the bare skin of her navel. Unconsciously, he had begun stroking the warm smoothness beneath his fingers. Under her sleep shirt, his fingers ghosted sleepily over a hipbone, her belly button, and then the low line of her underwear. When his eyes opened soon after, he breathed in a deep breath of Rey’s pure, early morning scent. He came more fully awake with the urge to taste her as well.

Her sleep shirt was hiked up enough for him to start at her ribs. Inching his way down at a wholly relaxed pace, he savored the morning glow leaking out from her soft skin, soaking into his lips.

When he reached the level of her hip, he felt her beginning to come awake. Kylo stroked fingers along her side, giving her plenty of time to rise to full wakefulness as he spoke a soft morning greeting. 

When Rey rolled onto her back, Kylo shifted above her - arms bracketed on either side of her while his mouth traced an idle path just above the line of her underwear. Rey slowly stretched, her body arching up beneath him slightly. She released a rumbling sound between a sigh and a wistful hum, as Kylo’s journeying lips reached her other hip where he lingered, sucking languid kisses. 

Her eyes still barely open, she blindly reached a hand down to find him.

“Come up here,” she drawled.

Kylo lifted his gaze to her face. He took just a moment to take in her entirely relaxed, sleep-soft features before he stretched up for her lips. 

Still wrapped in the lingering remnants of sleep, Rey was pliant and responsive. Her hands fluttered along his broad shoulders, sliding lazily up his neck and into his hair as he gently parted her lips with his own. Not worrying about symmetry or pace, they kissed with languid, imprecise enjoyment, exchanging slow strokes of lips and tongue.

With a wakening, searching hum against his mouth, Rey shifted; Her legs opening and relaxing beneath him while her arms closed and tightened over him, holding him against her.

As his kisses became more focused and searching, Rey slid her hands in a slow, deep drag down Kylo’s bare back. Once she reached the taper of his waist, she moved one hand to find her own shirt and slide it up, out of the way. Kylo’s lips had already begun making their way across her jaw and down her neck, as Rey’s free hand found one of his and pulled it towards her. 

Following her urging, he cupped a hand against one of her breasts. From her neck, his mouth skipped down further. Once his lips mapped the rise of her other breast and circled once around the still-warm skin, he took his time rolling her nipple beneath his tongue. Slow heat began to spread through him when he finally sucked it into his mouth, feeling it harden between his lips while his fingers coaxed its twin to a similar response.

Her sleepy sighs gradually sharpening and becoming more alert, Rey’s hands fell back to the pillows, one sinking into her own hair and the other extending out, blindly grasping.

Her legs found purchase on either side of his hips, hooking him in close while she began to thrust up against him, her body seeking him everywhere all at once.

After the brief, necessary separation associated with the fumbling of sleep clothes, Rey sighed in a loud, grateful rush as Kylo sank into her and his arms came around her again. While her hands tightened against his back to hold him close, she let the rest of her remain caught in early-morning indolence. With all of her pliant and relaxed, she opened to him so easily that it seemed Kylo could fill her from head to toe. Rey closed her eyes and gave herself over entirely, gasping as he surged in like waves consuming the shoreline. 

Kylo marveled at the duality of her: That she was so fierce and unyielding in all else, yet here with him in the early morning hours, she was an infinite, supple surrender. There was no resistance, no tension - Each slide into her body was a tender, heady welcome and his hands yearned to smooth over every tantalizingly pliable inch of her. He settled for curving one hand under her thigh and lifting, easing her as wide open as her sleep-relaxed muscles would give. Heat surged through her and when she gave a soft cry, he leaned in to drink the sweet sounds from her lips. 

After he drowned in her and her body consumed all of him it could, they remained messily locked together. Rey felt so sweetly, immensely full in every sense of the word – Her body brimming with satisfaction and feeling with him hot in her arms. 

When he eventually shifted off of her, it wasn’t to go far. Neck bent, he laid his mouth against her shoulder. His words were half-obscured when he mumbled, “Missed you yesterday.”

 

Sunday

Rey definitely wasn't watching Kylo sleep. She definitely wasn't admiring the relaxed, bared beauty of him in the dim holo light. The slow flow of breath between his parted, pink lips; the occasional flutter behind his eyelids; the radiant innocence and unassuming calm embodied in his sleeping features.

Fine, Rey was watching him; Seeing straight to the heart of him - through the abrasive shell this essence was usually hidden and insulated beneath. The same shell that had fooled Rey so thoroughly when they met.

When she'd first seen him stride into that exhibition hall on Jakku, she had thought something along the lines of: Nice hair, too bad he radiates insufferable ass.

But then Kylo had stood up for her when she faced Snoke's rude criticism. She'd considered then that maybe he was capable of something beyond scornful artificiality and self-absorption. There had been something burning bright in his eyes, when he'd asked her to work for him. "But not to me," he'd said, and something had leapt like flames behind his eyes - something Rey could neither dismiss nor deny its compelling effect on her.

She wondered for a moment what might have been, if she hadn't accepted his offer. Would she still be on Jakku? Still determinedly pushing her way through every job that came her way? 

Organizing fashion exhibitions and galas had never been her goal - It was just where a driven and resourceful orphan had worked her way up to. Would she still be desperately trying to keep her mind busy, so she didn't think about the fact that she had nothing to work towards – only an empty past to escape?

Back in the present, watching Kylo sleep beside her with the low thrum of the Supremacy's boosters and hyperspace around them, Rey was fervently glad for whatever force had guided her into that director job with the daunting task of accommodating Supreme Designer Kylo Ren - Be it fate or merely serendipity.

Lost in thought and the depth of the present moment, Rey didn't immediately react when Kylo's eyes fluttered open. Taking a moment to focus, his sight slid into slow connection with his mind to confirm Rey's head rested close to his on the pillows, and she was looking right at him with far-off, complex gentleness.

"Whatsit?" He sleep-slurred. "Why're you staring?"

Rey's lips curled in a fond, indecipherable smile.

"The same reason you were staring at me in the kitchen the other morning."

Kylo blinked slowly several times, his brain entreating him to come awake more quickly. Then, with realization, a mirroring smile spread across his own lips.

With the gentle reach of relaxed limbs, he drew her in close against his chest as she curled in towards him, all the better to fit into his arms. She threw one of her arms across him while the other curled in between their chests. She nestled her head in beneath his chin, fitting naturally into the space against him that was just her size.

Kylo’s eyes closed again. His hands drifted up to Rey’s hair, his fingers threading in as if to cradle her head where it rested beside his heart.

In the early Sunday hours, they drifted back to sleep together – his parted lips a breath away from her brow and the rise and fall of her chest matching his heartbeat.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> More of these two to come!! I know I made a list at the end of chapter 4 of further scenes I had in mind, and I still hope to get to them all. As always, it would mean a lot to hear if you enjoy spending time in this silly AU as much as I do!


	6. Leather And Skin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I didn't think I was going to post this. Really, I didn't even mean to write it... These two just make writing sex scenes for them wayyyy too easy. I was working on the promised epilogue chapters when I saw a bunch of photosets of Adam Driver looking Really Damn Fine at red carpet premieres and... this happened. It's not even my fault, okay?

Kylo had looked incredible all night. With his jet-black three-piece suit, long leather coat fluttering in his wake as he strode through the gala hall, and his hair tousled back from his face, Rey hadn't been able to focus on a single thing all night. 

His interviews seemed endless; Her management tasks unbearable tedious. All she could think about was her frustration that she had to spend most of the night on the other side of the hall from him while reporters, photographers, and other designers swarmed around him. Her restless anticipation kept jumping ahead to when this damn event would finally be over, and she would have him all to herself. Rey was already thinking about the wide, luxurious bed waiting in the hotel suite. Or the plush carpet on the floor. Or the back of the door would be perfectly satisfactory as well.

Rey didn't care where. She didn't care how. As the night went on and on, all she knew was that she needed him. Badly. Staring at him from a distance was starting to grow painful, and yet the throbbing heat growing within her wouldn't allow her to look anywhere else. 

Once things finally began wrapping up and people began filtering out through the hall's wide entryway, Rey needed to get out. She wanted nothing more than to march over, collect Kylo, and drag him out with her. But he was still, infuriatingly, surrounded by media and admirers. At any other event, he would have welcomed her extricating him from the swarm of attention. But Rey knew that he had come to this event with the goal of drumming up interest around his newest experimental clothing line, and the more reporters he spoke to, the better. Feeling bothered, frustrated, and far, far too hot, Rey marched towards one of the back exits as soon as things had wound down enough for her to delegate the remaining wrap-up tasks. 

The second Rey opened the door back at the lavish hotel suite the event organizers had reserved for Kylo, she started pulling her dress off over her head. Her skin felt tight and hot, and she couldn't stop going over in her head each detail of Kylo's appearance at tonight's gala. Remembering the shining waves of his hair, the black leather stretched across his wide shoulders, the crisp buttons of his black waistcoat, Rey blindly kicked off her shoes and fingered open her bra. Letting clothes drop where they fell, she perched on the table in the center of the room. Her breathing was already hitched and high as she lifted a leg and bent over it to roll her stockings off. Without even consciously planning it, her underwear were shed next. 

Then she had both hands cupped over her breasts. Her eyes were closed, and as her fingers squeezed she imagined they were Kylo's large, powerful hands. She thumbed her nipples, licked her bottom lip, and tried desperately to conjure up the feeling of Kylo's tongue. It wasn't enough, not nearly, but her body was desperate for anything remotely approximating him. 

Breathing hard in need, Rey's knees slid apart and a hand drifted down between them. She wasn't surprised to find herself already wet, but let out a low moan all the same as her fingers began moving. 

It wasn’t nearly enough, but the memory of him in glistening black, the center of attention in the opulent gala hall, made her helpless to stop.

That was when the key clicked into the other side of the door, the knob turned, and Kylo stepped into the suite. When he processed the sight greeting him, his mouth fell open and it was a fortunate thing the door closed again automatically, for he had forgotten all basic logic and rationality.

Rey was sitting on the round wooden table in the center of the room. Perched on the side facing him, her knees were spread apart. She was stark naked, and one hand was working and shaking between her thighs. 

She heaved a ragged sigh at the sight of him – One of relief and yet utter torture. 

“Kylo. _Finally_ you’re here… I need you. Everywhere. I’ve needed you all night…”

All the air dropped out from Kylo’s senses. His blood was pounding in his ears, his heart racing through every inch of him as his eyes darted madly between her flushed face, looking at him with eyes that were begging, pleading – and the place where her hand disappeared between her thighs, moving in stuttering, desperate motions. 

Kylo’s brain shut down. There was only instinct and a raging flame that kindled instantly, deep in his center. There was only her. 

Moving towards her on shaky legs, Kylo reached for the buttons of his clothes. Rey caught the motion and immediately stopped him. 

“No, I like it this way,” she whispered, her voice nothing but need. “Me naked, but you still dressed like that.”

Obeying, he left his clothes in tact, though they already felt torturously hot. When he reached her, he hesitated for a moment, the speed and intensity of his desire for her leaving him grappling to decide how to proceed – where to touch her first. 

“You were waiting for me?” Kylo asked in nothing but bare, thin breath. “Thinking of this all night?”

“All night,” she admitted, voice ragged. Her knees slid open wider – wide enough to let him between them – and her hand fell away. Kylo’s brain stalled and he moved in a desperate flash.

Lurching into her, he claimed her mouth roughly while his hands clamped to her lower back, drawing her to the edge of the table and flush against him. At the first instant of contact, Rey moaned urgently, her hands grappling at his shoulders. He swallowed her moans hungrily, licking into her mouth like he meant to conquer every inch. Rey sucked his tongue, her fingers gripping his shoulders. His hands still encased in gloves, his fingers made hot friction where they clutched against the curve of Rey’s lower back, tugging her in closer. 

The leather of his coat was rough against her bare fingers, but felt incredible against the soft skin of her thighs where her legs closed around him of their own accord. In the limited way she could from her sitting position, she ground herself against him and the layers of leather and cashmere adorning his tall frame. Kylo pulled her bottom lip between his teeth with a soft growl, swearing he could feel the heat radiating from between her legs, calling to him. 

It was his. And he meant to claim it.

Torn between wanting to reach the most powerful part of her right away and the need to taste her everywhere, Kylo bent his head to her chest with sucking kisses and possessive bites. He nibbled and licked at each nipple just long enough to feel it go hard against his tongue. Feeling her arch towards him and her breathing hitching up higher and faster by the moment, he moved a hand from her back to knead whichever breast his mouth hadn’t currently claimed. His leather-clad fingers pinched and rolled the nipple already wet and shining from his mouth. 

Rey released a sharp moan, and Kylo felt her hands spasm slightly against his shoulders. 

“Inside,” she gasped through raging arousal. “Inside me. Kylo, I’ve been so empty, all night…”

Kylo cursed. Then he dropped to his knees between her spread legs. Her thighs opened farther for him in welcome, and just from sight he could see she was already swollen and shining and bright, bright red with arousal. 

Transfixed, Kylo slid one of his gloved hands up her thigh. With the tip of one thumb, he rubbed back and forth across her, watching the wetness spread as she grew even more flushed. He spread her open, collecting her arousal on his fingertips. Withdrawing his hand, he rubbed his fingers together, watching a few drops roll off. Without thinking, he lifted his hand and slowly, deliberately wiped the remaining drops across his mouth.

Rey made a broken sound at the sight.

Kylo couldn’t breathe. Fortunately, breath wasn’t nearly as essential in that moment as she was. 

His expensive leather coat spilling over the floor, his suit jacket still buttoned, and every inch of his skin hot with need for her, Kylo bent his head in between her thighs to take her with his mouth. 

Rey gasped, her head falling back and fire flooding through her when Kylo’s teeth scraped against her aching clit. When his lips closed in an open-mouthed kiss and he started sucking, she sobbed a little. 

Kylo was in awe of her. He had never felt her so wet. He had never felt her hot and throbbing like this between his lips. He tongued her clit, chasing a desperate, primal need to drink down every drop leaking from her. After licking messily and hungrily, he chased all of her dripping wetness to its source. She was begging, almost crying with desperation when Kylo’s tongue circled her a few times. 

And then the heat of her pulled him in and he chased it blindly. With a surge of his shoulders pushing her knees farther up and apart, he delved into her. The cry she gave split into frantic, hurried chanting of his name as his tongue plunged in repeatedly, raiding everywhere it could reach. He moaned brokenly into her while her taste and heat overwhelmed his senses. There was only the sweet, squeezing press of her against his mouth, and the points of sharp pleasure-pain where she gripped ragged handful of his hair. 

Tonguing her deeper and deeper, Kylo shuddered each time he felt her inner muscles spasm in helpless indecision between repulsing the invasion and opening for the pleasure. Each time, her fingers would wind more tightly in his hair and her moans would go high and breathy above him. His favorite sensation in the entire world was feeling her body – the unconscious, uncontrollable inner parts of her – open itself to his entry and allow itself to be possessed and pleasured, once he had worked his way deeply enough and demonstrated his devotion. Rey’s body was every bit as resolute and fierce as she was. But working for its admittance and surrender was the sweetest work he would ever do.

She was still dripping against his tongue. She was still panting above him, her bare thighs still trembling on either side of his neck. He needed more – each nerve in his body a live wire sizzling with the need for active release. He’d been hard since the moment he walked through the door and saw Rey there naked. Now, his arousal was so intense, it bordered on pain. Rey released a desperate, disappointed mewl when his tongue withdrew, leaving her empty and throbbing again. 

“I’m coming, love,” Kylo reassured. His fingers blindly fighting to get his pants unhooked, he lifted himself to his feet in jerking motions. Rey pulled him in for messy, unsynchronized kisses, needing to keep tasting and touching him while he opened his pants but, in accordance with her wishes, remained dressed. 

Her knees hooked around his hips, the white of her skin made a bright contrast to the dark leather of his coat. “Rey,” he panted her name into her mouth as his hands pulled her closer to him, all the way to the edge of the table.

He tilted her backwards slightly in his arms when he surged in the first time, immediately beginning to thrust in a desperate, reckless need to reach the deepest depths of her as quickly as possible. Crying out his name, she leaned farther back in his arms slightly – not far enough to lose the heat radiating off him, but just enough so she could hitch her legs up higher and he could delve in to her completely.

Rey made herself open her eyes so she could see him. While he thrust into her in a hard, desperate rhythm, making boiling pleasure radiate out from her core and lick all the way to her hair – His hair was beginning to fall in unkempt, sweaty tangles against his forehead. She could see lines of his sweat running down into the once-crisp lapel of his suit jacket. The arms with which he held her were still clad in weathered black leather, and the feel of it against her bare skin brought goose bumps everywhere. Impossibly, he looked even more attractive than he had all night – With that flush in his face, the unkempt mess of his hair where Rey’s fingers had pulled through it, and the slightly disheveled twist of his waist coast where the jerking movements of his desperate, unthinking passions had pulled it askew. 

Rey came apart. Kylo made a fractured sound when Rey shook silently in his arms, climaxing so hard she could only gasp for breath and cling to him while her body seized frantically around him – overwhelmed by the pleasure he flooded her with, even while her body tightened and clung to him as if never wanting to let him free. 

He was so deeply tangled within her, the exchange of sensation was instantaneous. He felt her flood of release course into him. He gasped for breath around her name, against her gasping mouth, as he thrust in wildly a few final times. Then his world – her – imploded around him. He had to clutch her close to him to keep from drowning. His hips stuttered to a halt – still buried all the way inside her as they gasped together through the crescendo of shocks. 

It took a long moment before either could breathe or think properly. Rey let her head drop forward onto Kylo’s shoulder, all of her limbs still wrapped around him. She wished he could stay this close always; Wished he could always be here inside of her, creating this sweet, delirious place that existed only in the cradle of his arms. 

Kylo waited as long as he could – putting off the moment of withdrawal until the very last ripples receded, and he knew it would be too much for him to remain in her bliss. 

Rey made a mournful sound when he withdrew, her arms not letting him step away, even if he had wanted to. Her head still against his shoulder, she murmured, “Now, I need to you to carry me to the bed, get undressed, and hold me.”

Kylo couldn’t help smiling at the gentle yet unmistakable command in her worn-out voice. He tilted his head to the side to kiss her brow. “Anything.”

Gathering her up in his arms, he lifted her from the table and carried her across the room to the wide bed heaped with pillows and fluffy duvets. With her arms wrapped around his neck and her head resting against his shoulder, he took his time. She was entirely relaxed and pliant in his arms, small and impossibly soft.

In his black-clad arms, she was a pure white light.

When he finally had to lay her down, he laid her so slowly and carefully in the bed, it was as if the woman of fire and iron who drank up his most passionate intensity and demanded still more had transfigured to a being of glass and air. 

Kylo shrugged out of his leather coat and hung it over the bottom of the bed. The leather he’d made it from cost a small fortune and it really should be hung up properly – but the moments it would take to cross the room to the closet were an unthinkable span of time to be separated from Rey. 

While she slid underneath the blankets and held them up for him to slip in beside her, he let all the various parts of his ruined suit drop to the carpeted floor. He had not a thought or care for anything in the world but her, and having her in his arms again at the soonest possible moment. 

Once his gloves, boots, shirt, pants, and underwear littered the floor, Kylo slid under Rey's arm where she had lifted the duvets and met her skin-to-skin. She released a blissed sigh of bone-deep comfort and satisfaction when he pulled her close and wrapped her up in his arms. His lips found her forehead again.

"I'm never going to forget that sight when I walked in here," he murmured, his tone gentle but tinged with mischief. Rey smiled to herself.

"And that wasn't even me trying to be seductive."

"Heavens help me."

"That was just how desperate you made me. Heavens help ME."

"I wasn't doing anything to try to torment you."

"You didn't have to. Putting that outfit on and commanding the whole gala room all night was enough."

Kylo hummed against her skin. 

Before being with Rey, he'd never felt sexy in his whole life. Hence why he dressed up all the time - the expensive, tailored clothes were more a costume or disguise then a reflection of how he saw himself. 

Then there came Rey. Once he realized the incredible; that his touch could make her tremble and his kiss could make her moan for him, he finally felt perfectly at peace whenever he looked in the mirror. 

Still, he was amazed that he had evoked such a response in her tonight, and completely unconsciously. Kylo knew full well that he often watched Rey across crowded rooms or during public events when she was too busy to notice. Just talking, just scribbling notes, just laughing when someone made a joke, she could be impossibly beautiful and absorb his attention entirely. It was strange to imagine she did the same when he wasn't looking. Strange - yet strangely wonderful.

Rey let out a sigh as she cuddled closer into his side. “And I wasn’t the only one. You know what the worst part of tonight was? Other than not being able to touch you all night?”

“Other than that?” Kylo prompted, unable to hold back a twinge of amusement.

“These models who were seated near me.” Rey made a sound somewhere between disgust and frustration, briefly sticking her tongue out for dramatic emphasis of her distaste. 

“I kept hearing them talking about all the things they swore they would do with you, if they could only get you alone.”

Kylo wasn’t sure what the proper response would be to Rey’s annoyance, so he remained still until she spoke again. 

Drawing idle patterns on his chest, she mused, “I can’t wait until we’re married. Then everyone will know they can’t fantasize about you anymore.”

Kylo decided not to point out that their being married likely wouldn’t have much bearing on anyone’s fantasies. He very much doubted that the First Order staff members who were secretly in love with Rey would instantly fall out of love the day she married him. But Kylo could hardly blame them. And knowing that Rey would be sleeping and waking at his side for the rest of their lives, he really didn’t mind. Commanding people not to fall in love with Rey would be like commanding flowers not to grow towards the sun.

“Do you remember when I was banned from exhibitions on Chandrila?”

Rey’s brow creased in puzzlement at the seemingly abrupt change of subject.

“Sure. They asked you back a year later but you said you had no interest. Although, I’m still unclear on what got you banned. I was with you the last time you exhibited on Chandrila, but I missed whatever made the event organizers so mad at you.” 

With an arm curled around her shoulders, Kylo’s thumb stroked absently back and forth along her upper arm.

“It happened just after the exhibition ended, when cleanup was just beginning. I was standing backstage somewhere, but you were out on the stage, under the lights, helping our teams get cleanup procedures going. You were walking around, lifting and carrying things, laughing and smiling, and I couldn’t help watching you…”

Rey wondered where in the world this was going, until Kylo cleared his throat and his voice hardened slightly from the drifting, loving tone he’d been using.

“I wasn’t the only one. I noticed two of the event stagehands - local staff – kept whispering among themselves and laughing. Once I realized their attention was on you, I couldn’t help listening. Then they started making rude comments about you, of the most distasteful nature. So, when they didn’t stop, I punched them both.” 

“You _what_?”

Rey wrenched up into a sitting position. She gaped down at him, trying to tell if he was joking. He gave a nod of only the most serious nature.

“That’s why I was banned. And I’d do it again. Regardless, I’m never going back to an event on Chandrila, no matter how much they beg me for business.”

Rey stared at him for a moment longer. “You’re joking.”

Kylo shook his head. “Not a bit. But don’t worry, no one in the First Order would ever be so crude. I’m not going to start going around punching our employees for looking at you.”

Rey thought back, trying to remember the details of that event. She had to go back far in her memories…

“Wait..,” she paused, squinting as she counted up the time in her head. “The Chandrila event was only a couple months after I started working for you.”

Kylo said nothing – not denying or correcting her. 

“Already?” 

She asked the word in a soft, reverent whisper. Kylo gave a shy, half lift of one shoulder, not quite meeting her eyes.

“I suppose. Yes.”

Kylo’s indefinite yet revealing reply lingering in the air, it took a long moment before his gaze could make its way from the ceiling down to her face, where R leaned over him. Rey’s eyes were twinkling at him brightly. His eyes locked in to hers, he lifted a hand to cup her cheek. 

Now and then, moments came when Rey found the immensity of everything Kylo professed she was to him to be utterly impossible. Not because she didn’t believe him, but because it strained credibility that anything so great and powerful could exist _anywhere_ , much less that it was all hers. 

But then there was the gentleness with which Kylo’s fingers brushed her face, his thumb tracing the curve of her cheek to the corner of her lips, and the worlds of reality and the fantastical merged again. 

He sat up to find her lips with his own. She cupped his jaw, and tasted the truth on his tongue. They shared slow, gentle kisses as they drifted back down to the bed together. 

“You’re always saying how you think I’m too good for you. But you know it’s the reverse, right?” 

His lips a breath away, he hushed her nonsensical words with another kiss.

“For as long as I’ve known you, everything you say has always been true and honest. Except that.”

Rolling with him on the bed now as their kisses mingled with hints of laughter, Rey whispered mischievously, “And the times when I try to convince you that my leggings are more comfortable than any designer pants in existence?”

Lying above her, Kylo pulled back only enough to toss the hair from his eyes and fix her with a dubious look, even while the fond smile never faded from his lips.

“There you go too far.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I promise, wedding announcement epilogue is coming soon!


	7. The Bookends

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I have not forgotten my favorite AU! I was just taking forever filling all the promises I made for upcoming scenes, indulging in every new idea that came to mind, and then finding a way to weave it all together in a way that makes sense! This chapter is almost equal word length to all the previous ones put together, so with this, I think I can finally say that I've done the best I can in realizing this world and relationship to the fullest. I hope a few people still see this some 6 months later, and that anyone who's followed the Supreme Designer up to this point finds some of the same fulfillment in this section that I found in writing it!

Rey knew they were talked about. She knew their staff speculated endlessly about the nature and seriousness of her and Kylo's relationship. She couldn't quite blame them - After all, she'd been less than entirely clear on it herself until only recently. It had been a month since Coruscant Fashion Week, but Rey still beamed to herself in secret, whenever she had a private moment.

Rey had become accomplished at dodging her colleagues' frequent, uncomfortable attempts to pry details from her. On one memorable occasion, two women from the financial management team with whom Rey had developed close friendships both cornered her, demanding she settle a dispute between them. The topic of their disagreement: Kylo's prowess in the bedroom. 

Rey's face had flamed, shocked by her friends' flippant discussion of their boss's private life. They had responded to Rey's disapproval with, "What? This is only what every gossip rag in the whole galaxy wonders. But you're the only one who can solve the mystery for us, and we promise whatever you say will go no farther!"

Rey had scoffed, "That's likely!"

"You don't trust us?"

"Don't change the topic. I'm not talking about this!"

Rey had determinedly pushed her way free from the ambush, but her flushed face gave her away.

"Oh - He's good, isn't he?" Nora surmised with a knowing, devious smile at the color rising in Rey's face.

Rey sputtered, "You can't - I didn't..."

But Nora, who'd read her like a book, only knocked her companion’s arm. "I told you! No way a guy with talent and intensity like that wouldn't be spectacular."

Lis looked disappointed to be proved wrong. "Really, Rey? He gives you so many headaches, I figured he'd be just as high-maintenance in bed."

Rey frowned in thunderous frustration: Her principled determination not to humor them warring with her instinctive defensiveness of Kylo. She finally settled on the terse, measured reply, "Let's just say... It's the one area where he leaves nothing to be desired."

To Rey's horror, the next time Kylo had met with the financial management team, Lis and Nora had been inappropriately.... giggly every time Kylo addressed them. Rey had shot them burning glares over Kylo's shoulder, until they managed professionalism again. 

Rey spent the rest of the meeting in a state of strange, frustrated discontent. Her usual attention to detail flagged, and she knew the figures she was noting down weren't correct as she silently gnashed her teeth. But she couldn't seem to concentrate through the squirming feeling in her chest and the coiling heat in her stomach. Her friends were going to get it later - For cajoling her into revealing entirely inappropriate details about their boss, for turning this finance meeting into one of the most torturous experiences of her life… and especially for the appraising, appreciative looks they kept sweeping up and down Kylo whenever he wasn't looking.

It felt like days later when Kylo finally ended the meeting and dismissed them. On their way out, Nora actually winked at her and Rey bit the inside of her lip furiously. Silence ensued for a long moment after the door slid closed behind them, leaving Rey and Kylo alone in the small meeting room with no windows.

"So... Was it my imagination, or was there something very amiss during that meeting?" Kylo finally asked. 

Rey swallowed, at a loss. Then, he turned towards her with inquisitive, curious eyes, and Rey had an epiphany of unrefined, unwise, but overwhelming need.

"No idea what you mean."

Then she'd practically leapt across the small room and upon him. Unprepared but certainly not unhappy, Kylo caught her and responded to her avid, hungry kisses first with hesitation, then needed less than a minute for his own body to reach a state of equal agitation.

"Where...," he panted the unintelligible, yet crucial question into Rey's mouth. Rey's hands were already pulling at the fastenings of his pants. 

"Here." She replied emphatically. He didn't argue.

Within the space of a few hungry, heated minutes, there was no space at all between them. Kylo pinned Rey up against the wall with his own body and hands spread under her thighs to hold her there. Her legs clutching tight around his waist, she maneuvered herself down into each of Kylo's frantic, messy thrusts. Rey couldn't seem to catch her breath, but the rush for breath mirrored her body's rush for pleasure - a perfect clamor for desperate release.

~

In a few days, all the mystery would soon be resolved. Rey wasn't sure whether she looked forward to having everything official, or if she would miss the privacy and intrigue of her and Kylo's undefined cohabitation behind closed doors.

Twice every year, Kylo convened the entire First Order on the Supremacy, gathering together all staff from his ships and facilities across the galaxy. Trainings and orientations would be held for staff transitioning into new roles for the following 6-month term, and Kylo would address all the people who maintained and ran the First Order as the market-dominating empire it had grown to become. After commenting on sales and production performance, he would outline the new projects and clothing lines he planned to roll out in the next term.

As it happened, Kylo's next address was only a few days away. Rey had helped him prepare as usual, providing him summaries of sales in all sectors and projections of market performance for his in-the-works projects. 

In a wholly separate area of their lives, wedding planning was only in the most abstract stages. But they had discussed enough to know that their wedding would impact Kylo's staff (soon to be their staff? Rey still worked to wrap her mind around that one), and so would have to be announced to the First Order as a whole.

Rey stood off to the side while Kylo spoke. She knew the numbers by heart and he had already shown her all the new lines in development, so she wasn't listening quite as raptly as the several hundred personnel and staff gathered in the Supremacy's largest hangar wing. Kylo stood on a platform raised just high enough so everyone could see him and his voice could carry through the hangar.

"You've all done commendable work this term - as evidenced by the strength of last quarter's numbers. I would especially like to recognize the production team in the Tabor system, for keeping up with our largest influx of orders on record."

Rey smiled to herself as Kylo listed off recognitions and accomplishments. Two speeches ago, Rey had suggested adding this section, as a way for Kylo to build more positive rapport with his staff. While all his employees seemed to view him with awe, a good portion were also still terrified of him. 

("Giving out praise now and then won't hurt, you know. Then everyone won't just be waiting in fear for the next time you find something to chew them out about." Kylo's bottom lip had gone tense, looking uncomfortable but thoughtful at the suggestion.)

As Kylo wrapped up the recognitions, his sizeable audience began to relax and smile at each other – 'That wasn't so bad.' But over at the back corner of the platform, Rey's anticipation was ratcheting up. The biggest bombshell was yet to come.

"There remains one last thing to address." Kylo paused and turned slightly, to shoot a brief glance in Rey's direction. Rey nodded slightly in encouragement. Kylo turned back to his staff and pressed on. "This concerns your vacation and leave schedules for the upcoming term." 

Some murmuring and apprehensive glances were exchanged, but not a single soul listening could have correctly predicted the news they were about to hear. 

"Rey has kept a painstaking account of all your accrued vacation days, and I assure you all that this will not affect those in any way."

Kylo took a beat to go over his phrasing in his mind, unwittingly letting the suspense mount.

"For one month in the upcoming term, I will be docking the Supremacy along with all the other command ships. During that time, operations will shut down completely, and production will be halted in all sectors. All shipping and ordering lines will be paused. You will all be given one month's vacation time, fully compensated, to spend however and wherever you'd like." 

Between tiny smatterings of confused whispering, the audience's deep silence underlined the concerned confusion that greeted the thoroughly strange announcement. Since its inception as a small, start-up designer brand, the First Order had never once halted operations. It had only kept growing and conquering, and not a single one of its employees would have believed its somber founder would ever put brakes on the kingdom he had poured years of his life into. 

For them to believe this most unlikely turn of events, they would have to know why. 

Kylo bit the bullet. “Rey and myself will both be absent for a month, and we decided it would be simplest and fairest to suspend all operations during that time, since there are no existing protocols for operations to continue in both of our absences. Now, as to why it’s necessary for both of us to take leave…” 

Kylo took a protracted pause. He audibly cleared his throat, shifting once from foot to foot. 

"Rey and I are marrying, and after the ceremony we'll be taking the remainder of the month to ourselves."

A flurry of gasps and excited murmurings filled the room. But rather than the celebratory response common to most marriage announcements, this one released a chaotic furor. When the noise level only rose, Rey had the dim realization over her own pounding heart: They don't believe it.

She saw Kylo's expression beginning to hint panic as Rey jumped into action. Joining Kylo at the front of the platform, Rey called over the din, "It's true!" 

Voices began to lower again, as the atmosphere in the mood perceptibly relaxed in response to Rey's voice. "And yes, he's really serious about you all having a month of paid time off. We couldn't exactly take the same for a honeymoon and expect you all to keep working while we're gone, could we?" Rey decided to go for humor to further lighten the mood. "And when we get back, I guess I’ll be the boss too, so you all better make sure you come back from that month in top shape, or else!”

Now there were smiles and bubbles of laughter. Though Rey had always held the authority of a superior since she carried out Kylo’s direct orders, staff at all levels thought of her as one of their own, thanks to the collegial warmth she showed everyone; in stark contrast to Kylo’s brusque formality. Hearing it from Rey made the news suddenly much easier to believe. 

Rey relaxed as she felt the entire hangar livening up and warming. His panic finally ebbing, Kylo marveled at how easily Rey had salvaged the situation – how she held the entirety of his company in the palm of her hand, and how pleased they all seemed to be there. The look of wonder he gave her could alone have served as testament to the truth of their engagement.

Rey’s friends were calling up to her now, the single voices a jumble through the excited chatter filling the hangar. Several shouts echoed similar questions.

“What if we want to come?”

“Do we get to come to the wedding?”

“Throw a big reception and invite us all!”

Grinning now and feeling light as could be, Rey briefly looked over to meet Kylo’s eyes. He looked utterly taken aback by this outpouring of amiable interest in his, or rather, their lives. 

Rey didn’t miss a beat. “Sorry, everyone. Our wedding will not be a First Order staff party. But I’ll plan us one next year, since I’ll be able to do that now. No – We were just planning a private ceremony. No media, no party; Just us.” 

Unable to suppress another smile from bubbling up, Rey reached out automatically to find Kylo’s gloved hand beside her. The link of hands was a small movement, but escaped the notice of none.

An errant shout came from the far end of the hangar, "Then kiss!" Raucous laughter followed. Then - to both Rey and Kylo's amusement - more voices took up the call.

Clearly, their relationship had been a much stronger source of curiosity than they'd realized.

Rey's mind was already racing ahead for a quick deflection tactic, assuming Kylo would be loath to public displays of affection. But before she could come up with anything, one of Kylo's arms hooked her around the waist. In the next moment, Kylo spun her into a firm kiss. Cheers erupted, and Rey laughed against Kylo’s mouth in surreal delight as one of her hands landed on his shoulder. They let the kiss linger in playful indulgence before separating, and now there was no missing the jubilant air filling the hangar, making this quite unlike any First Order all-staff gathering that had ever come before. 

An infectious force seemed to be making everyone quite forget their normal professionalism. Whether it was the crowd’s surprise and glee, or Rey and Kylo’s palpable affection, none could really say for sure. Perhaps the two fed each other. 

With Rey tucked against his side, Kylo felt relaxed like never before, while looking out over a sea of people with their attention all upon him. He'd always marveled at how natural Rey acted around their staff, but now for the first time he felt a touch of her assurance himself. He seemed released from the rigid formality and dour seriousness that usually so intimidated his staff. 

Leaning forward slightly, he quipped, “You’re all getting a pay cut for not believing me.” To his own surprise, the joke flew and laughter followed. He decided he enjoyed this new experience of his addresses ending in levity. 

Once they descended from the platform, Rey was immediately engulfed by friends and well-wishers. (“Marrying?!” “We had no idea it was like that!” “You’re so lucky, Rey.” “You deserve this!”)

To Kylo’s surprise and sincere appreciation, some of the stream of well-wishers flowed past Rey and on to him. He accepted handshakes and congratulatory pats on the arm with equally pleased and perplexed thanks. (“Congratulations!” “She’s a real catch.” “We wish you both nothing but happiness.”)

Then one of the techs who worked on the Supremacy’s command bridge broke from the group surrounding Rey and approached Kylo meekly. Thinking back to the times he’d seen Rey interacting with him, Kylo was fairly sure his name was Jonas (and Rey had already admonished Kylo before for forgetting the name).

“Congratulations, sir. You’re very lucky. Rey is the kindest, most considerate person I’ve ever met. I-… I hope you’ll always treat her with all the goodness she deserves.”

Kylo was silent for a beat, thrown and unsure how to respond. He settled on, “That’s precisely what I intend. Thank you, Jonas.”

Jonas jolted slightly from the point on the floor where his gaze had been fixed. He looked up directly at Kylo for the first time, surprised at being called by name. He managed a slight smile and nod before gathering himself enough to move on.

Luckily for Kylo, who was already approaching the distressing limit of people he could talk to all at once, Rey soon rejoined his side so she could speak for both of them. Watching her beside him, Kylo saw her with new eyes – Just like everyone around them now saw something different, watching the two of them together. Rey wasn’t fulfilling a work contract, she wasn’t just supporting her boss – She was standing at the side of the man who would soon be her husband, and it was something wholly separate from work that bound them together. Kylo felt himself every bit of the awe and disbelief that had initially greeted the news of their engagement.

He told her as much later, in the evening when they were finally alone in Kylo’s suite. 

“I can’t blame them for not believing it. Most days, I still struggle to decide which is more incredible – That you exist at all, or that you’ve somehow agreed to be mine for the rest of our lives.”

“The rest of our lives is an awful long time… Think it’s too late to change my mind?”

“Much too late. Out of the question.”

Later, once they were in bed together and Rey had her head pillowed along the slope of Kylo’s shoulder, Kylo remarked, “Clearly I’m no expert in proper congratulatory behavior, but Jonas did say something to me that seemed odd.” 

Rey had had her eyes closed already as Kylo’s fingers trailed through her hair, but now she cracked them open again. “What did he say?”

“That you’re the kindest person he’s ever met, and I’d best be good to you.”

“He was that brave? I’ll have to tell him good job. What did you reply?”

“That that’s what I intend.”

“I’m impressed, but not particularly surprised he said something like that. You’ve probably guessed he’s a bit… well, infatuated with me, I suppose.”

“Has he ever told you as much?”

“Oh no, he was always much too shy for that. Plus he’s terrified of you.”

A minute of silence. Then Rey noticed Kylo’s fingers had paused in her hair.

“I can hear you thinking,” Rey murmured. “Talk.”

Kylo made a vague humming sound of contemplation. “It’s no surprise that I’m not the only one who’s fallen for you, but I suppose I never really stopped to consider that some of the others would be my own staff.”

Rey lifted her head slightly. “You’re not… threatened, are you?”

Kylo’s mouth scrunched in disgruntled thought. 

“That is a trick question. If I say yes, I’ll sound paranoid and overbearing. Yet if I say no, it will sound as if I don’t view my employees as real people who perhaps could win you away.”

“Well reasoned,” Rey complemented, laying her head down again. 

In truth, she’d had no idea how Kylo would respond, but she was pleased he’d answered with prudence rather than passion. 

“Well, to avoid that trick question having to come up again… It might be best if we step lightly around Jonas for a while, just until the wedding. Although, in that case…” Rey fell silent for a moment, thinking and gathering names. “Then you might also want to avoid Royn in the legal team, Terrel in marketing, Jay in the tech crew…”

“Now I’m feeling threatened.”

Rey giggled a little, rolling closer to give Kylo a consoling peck at the corner of his mouth.

“Don’t worry. If I got through all the models trying to get you into bed, you can certainly get through this.”

Kylo looked genuinely baffled for a moment, as if he failed to see how the two situations were comparable. 

“But I never had interest in any of them whatsoever. There was only ever you…”

He trailed off, finally getting it. 

As the holo lights in the bedroom dimmed, Rey rolled over onto her side and pulled Kylo’s arm over her, so he would fit in close against her back. Her fingers laced between his, she folded their hands together under her chin. The last thing she did before sleep was leave a kiss along each of Kylo’s fingers. The last thing she felt before sleep was Kylo tracing a matching pattern of kisses against her shoulder.

~

The next day was… strange. Whenever Kylo and Rey entered a room together, some audible reaction preceded them – Sometimes a burst of excited murmurings, sometimes out-loud ‘aw’s and fresh outpourings of congratulations. Turning slightly pink, Kylo would stoically attempt to carry on business as usual. 

Any meetings Rey had on her own, she spent the first five minutes fielding questions about herself and Kylo. Everyone seemed positively captivated by the whole affair. Answering how long they had been a couple, if being with the boss had made her job easier or harder, if she ever imagined they’d reach this point – Rey gradually realized she didn’t feel accosted by nosy gossips; Instead, more than ever she felt as if she were part of a huge extended family.

Lis and Nora cornered her the first chance they had.

“So you got him, huh? The Supreme Designer is yours for life!”

“When did it happen? How did he ask?”

They were both grinning so hard, they looked likely to strain muscles. Rey found herself helpless against a similar affliction. This one time, she didn’t mind divulging the details. 

“During Coruscant Fashion week. After the final gala night.” 

Both women gasped as if this were the single most romantic thing they’d ever heard. 

“We were back at his hotel suite and at first, I had no idea what he was trying to get at. Of course, he completely botched it at the beginning. But – as usual – I helped him and he got there in the end. The conversation was a perfect encapsulation of us as a whole, really. And…” Rey released a sort of dreamy sigh that, under normal circumstances, she wouldn’t be caught dead letting out of her mouth. “…By the end, I couldn’t remember ever feeling happier.”

Lis was fanning her face as if fighting tears back. Nora’s expression drifted between overjoyed on her friend’s behalf, and admiring yearning. 

“I’ve gotta admit, Rey, after you let slip that he’s good in bed I’ve been hoping that maybe there’d be a chance before you two tied the knot…”

Lis gasped and elbowed her friend hard to cut her off. Nora just grinned in her roguish way.

“But now he’s off limits, of course, and all yours, Rey.”

“Damn right. Though that’s been the case for years already, really.”

“Wait!” Nora threw up a hand in surprise. “Years? You mean he hasn’t been with anyone else this whole time since you were hired?”

Rey nodded. Even before they became lovers, her job duties had kept her at his side almost constantly and he’d never been one to take up dalliances. She’d never really thought of it as a particularly big deal before, figuring that his serious disposition and bouts of social anxiety made it impossible for him to be reckless in an area of life he took for deeply personal. Not a single detail of their first time together would ever fade from Rey’s memory – She remembered he’d been the more timid of the two of them.

Then again, he was one of the most affluent and successful men in the whole known galaxy. To all those who didn’t know him like Rey did, she supposed she understood how it might seem incredible. 

“Neither of us have,” Rey stated matter-of-factly. “Though it’s always entertaining to watch newly hired models make passes at him. He’s either oblivious or stoically indifferent, and either way it’s terribly amusing.”

The three laughed together. With mirth making her vision go fuzzy, Rey’s chest felt warm and bubbly. Lis and Nora knew they had work to do, but they lingered a few moments more.

“We really wish we could be there, at the wedding. But we understand that you want it to be a private affair. Once you open it to the hundreds of us in the First Order, it would be hard to keep press from sneaking in. You only get to marry him once, so better to keep it personal and intimate. I’m sure it will be beyond lovely, with just the two of you and your families.”

The warmth in Rey had ballooned higher and higher as Lis spoke, before abruptly popping at her final words. 

During the limited planning she and Kylo had already done, Rey hadn’t envisioned any further than herself standing close before Kylo, holding his hands until the moment when rings would be gently slid into place and they would become each other’s for life. Rey had thought about the concluding moment when he would kiss her as his wife for the first time; Wondered whether his lips would taste any different when he became her husband. 

But she hadn’t spent a thought for the silence that would immediately follow. She hadn’t imagined descending with him afterwards from that sacrosanct moment, without a mother valiantly losing a fight against tears; without a father looking on with a proud but quavering smile. 

Immediately she felt foolish, because the faces that had appeared in her mind were anonymous. Nothing more than an imagined vision of sentiment.

And yet, after the outpouring of excitement and support that had enveloped her and Kylo since the announcement, the idea of that silent ceremony seemed somehow odd and hollow.

Fortunately, her friends didn’t notice her off moment. 

Nora gushed on, “We’ll just have to wait impatiently for you to tell us all about it afterwards, Rey. And of course the dirty details about the month-long honeymoon, too.”

“Nora, give her a break!” 

Rey did her best to mirror their smiles.

“We’d best get back to work, Rey. Lots to do before the month off!”

After each giving Rey one last hug of excitement, the two headed off towards the Finance level. Rey made her way automatically towards her office, trying to ignore the off-kilter feeling dogging her steps.

~

The Supremacy’s corridors were empty when Rey finally made her way down to Kylo’s (now their) living suite. She dumped her things on the kitchen table in an uncharacteristic disorder. She took longer than necessary puttering around the kitchen, cleaning and putting away some lingering dishes, then brewing some tea. Mug in hand, she finally went through to the bedroom.

There, she found Kylo sitting in the middle of the bed, sketches spread around him. He looked up at her entrance and gave her a look bordering on sheepish.

“I know you’ve forbidden me from bringing work into the bedroom, but I’ve been trying to spend less nights in my studio because I know you don’t like that either…”

Rey let out a long breath. She smiled, and it was the most blessedly easy thing she’d done all day. Finally feeling calm and centered, at first she said nothing. Instead, she simply set her mug down and came to the bedside, where she could reach out to stroke Kylo’s hair back from where it fell into his eyes. His styling products always lost their battle by the day’s end, gradually letting the unruly waves of his long hair free again.

He seemed surprised as he looked up at her and still a touch apprehensive – as if waiting for the inevitable scolding.

“How was your day?” she asked instead.

Kylo blinked a few times. “Odd. At least twenty people asked me if the month-long shutdown really isn’t a joke. I had to keep assuring people that no, us getting married isn’t some elaborate prank on everyone in my company.”

They shared a brief smile, Rey’s fingers still in his hair. She had always loved his hair – there was something so soothing and intimate about stroking her fingers through it.

“I suppose it was nice, in a way,” Kylo went on thoughtfully. “People were coming up and talking to me because they wanted to, and didn’t scurry off first chance they got. Almost the way they talk to you.”

“I suppose they can finally relate to you. Now that everyone knows you do indeed have feelings like the rest of us. And you do actually think of things other than work now and then.”

“Mm. Only now and then.” 

He closed his eyes as Rey stroked his hair back again, then leaned towards the edge of the bed where he could curl his arms around her waist and rest his head against her chest. 

“How about your day?” 

Rey didn’t know what to say, think, or even feel. Most of the day – the simple part – had been wonderful. She decided to start there.

“I got flooded with questions too. But everyone was so excited and happy – like they’ve been dying for the chance to ask us for ages.”

“No doubt your eager friends in Finance accosted you at some point?”

“Of course. I never thought it appropriate before to tell them anything about us, so they were beside themselves that I finally talked today. You might find it amusing to hear that Nora confessed to being a touch disappointed. This means she’ll never get the chance to sleep with you some day.”

Kylo jolted back with wide, surprised eyes and Rey couldn’t hold back a slightly devilish laugh. Nora would hunt her down if she ever found out Rey had passed that on to Kylo; But serves her right for prying out inappropriate details about her and Kylo’s sex life Rey hadn’t meant to give up.

“Don’t look so surprised. I think you’re more popular than you realize,” Rey said, smoothing his hair again.

“If you say so,” he said uncertainly, still looking befuddled. 

Rey delighted in the charming mix of bewildered and embarrassed on his face – until her thoughts traced it back to the conversation that had ended with everything askew.

Kylo noticed the clouded distance that shifted across Rey’s face. His brow slanted down in concern, he extended a hand to clasp hers at her side.

“What is it?”

Rey took a long moment parsing her words and combing through her jumbled thoughts. She focused for a moment on just the feeling of her thumb rubbing across Kylo’s knuckles, letting it ground her.

“That excitement… The acceptance I was surrounded by today. It was… wonderful. For the first time in my life, I felt like I had a family.”

Surprised, Kylo regarded her silently for a long moment – His mind rushing in circles in a desperate dash to understand. To his own frustration, he came up dry.

“And… that made you sad?”

“No, no…” Breathing out in a rush, Rey turned to drop down on the bed beside him. Sighing, she was impatient only with herself. She kept a hold of his hand, cupping it in her lap between both of her own. “I suppose it made me wonder why we haven’t thought about… opening up our wedding.”

Kylo blinked, watching her studying their entwined fingers in her lap, her expression preoccupied by internal strife.

When she wasn’t looking at him – withholding the silent hints and prompts she usually supplied him – Kylo remained at a loss. Now and then he thought he was getting better at reading social clues, at picking things up without Rey having to explain all the minutiae. But then things like this happened – When something upset Rey and Kylo felt left in the dust, helpless to understand what had done this to her or how to fix it. She always helped him understand everything else, but when she was overwhelmed herself, Kylo had to fight his hardest to sense what to do for her who mattered most to him.

“So…,” he started tentatively, “You want to open the wedding to all five hundred and thirty-seven staff of the First Order? You know we couldn’t try just picking some to invite…”

“No, of course not – that’s not what I mean. It would become the craziest staff party there ever was. I think it’s just… Feeling that sense of community today made me wonder what could have been. … If things were different for me…”

Seeming to suddenly remember herself after being adrift for a long while, she turned towards Kylo beside her and gripped his hand more tightly. Kylo gave an inward sigh of relief to finally see her expressive eyes. 

She spoke in a tone focused and serious, “I’m… frustrated with myself for it, because this should be a time of nothing but happiness. But… speaking with everyone today made me think of Jakku, for some ridiculous reason.”

“You haven’t spoken of Jakku in years; Even then, hardly ever.”

Rey dropped her gaze from his face again.

“I’ve hardly thought about it for years.” Kylo tightened his fingers around hers – Assurance that he was here, even when she wasn’t looking. “It makes me feel stupid, but… I think everyone’s reactions today made me wonder what - … what my mother might have thought.”

Rey dropped her chin all the way down against her chest, hurriedly closing her eyes against the nonsensical, incensing rush of vulnerability that had suddenly closed over her when she spoke the words.

Meanwhile, Kylo frantically searched his memory for times Rey had mentioned her mother in the past. There was hardly anything to recall. She had explained in their early days together that she’d grown up alone on Jakku. There had been no parents to shelter or coddle her, and so she had accepted help from no one. She had worked and fought for her own living, and in the early years no job had been too demeaning or challenging. She had made a name for herself, and eventually took on event organizing and management jobs for Jakku’s small enclaves of elite society. 

Kylo had always assumed her disinclination to discuss her parents mirrored his own – That it reflected the same decisive turn to a new path, where there was neither time nor space for the people or places of earlier lives.

A moment too late, Kylo recognized the way Rey was ruthlessly biting her bottom lip – the way her shoulders fought desperately not to shake. 

Letting out a gasp of breath like a hit to the chest, Kylo hurriedly and ungracefully pulled her in, gathering all the pieces of her tight against him to meld them back together.

“S-Sorry, so stupid..,” she stuttered into his shoulder. Against her hair, he hushed her.

He stroked her back, his body tapping into the normal, natural affections and comfort that came on instinct, whenever she was locked close against him like this.

Inside, he was foundering entirely. He could count on one hand the times he’d seen her cry. Each time had caused him blind panic. He berated himself silently, wondering how and why he had assumed this whole time that Rey’s parents weren’t important to her.

She’d never seemed to want to talk about them – or about her past hardly at all, for that matter – but he wondered whether she’d been waiting for him to ask. Just because he liked his past buried beyond sight didn’t mean she felt the same about her own.

“I can’t even say I miss them. I can’t say I have any idea how they would react. I can’t even remember what they looked like. I was too young.”

Rey’s voice was small and spotty, and hearing it made Kylo wrap her up closer and tighter. 

In a bewildering rush, his chest erupted in fire and ice at the same time. Fire for the endless, passionate lengths to which he would go, to keep Rey safe and cherished so she would never speak like this again. Ice for his frigid contempt for anything in the world that made Rey shrink from the joyous, powerful expanse that was her natural being.

But Kylo had the feeling he needed to be levelheaded right now. He needed to stay calm and gentle for her. He needed to listen, before he could know how to help.

“Rey, you said you wondered if things had been different. Were you too young to remember?”

She made an aborted sniffling noise against his shoulder. “Old enough to remember the line of exhaust coming from their ship, when they left me. Then it was just the questioning, the anger, the loneliness in the years after… And just trying to feed myself, I never had the time to be sentimental. They were gone, and nothing would change that.”

She let out a deep, stuttering breath as if trying to gather herself together so she didn’t have to lean on him anymore – But Kylo didn’t let her pull away. He held her there tightly in place against him, his lips pressed against the side of her head. 

Of course he recognized it as impossible and irrational, but his heart and hands couldn’t let her go – As if trying to make up for every moment of her life when she had ever felt unloved or alone.

A silent vow that she never would again.

Rey felt the purpose in Kylo’s embrace and accepted that, for this brief time, she didn’t have to be strong. She let herself relax and fall entirely into the support of his arms. Nestling in closer, she savored the wide span of his chest and the way almost all of her could fit in his lap. Leaning her forehead against his neck, she did her best to slow her breathing, to stop the tears by grounding herself in the belonging of the here and now. 

In the way his arms cradled her in sacred gentleness, yet with a fervent strength she knew would never leave her cold or wanting. 

“I don’t know what to say,” Kylo admitted in a hushed, flat whisper – barely managing to cover the bitter edge of his own helplessness in the face of her pain.

Rey slowly curled an arm up the back of Kylo’s shoulders, her flingers clinging tightly while she turned her head in closer against him.

“Say that you’ll always be here. That my home will always be with you.”

Kylo cradled a hand against the back of her neck, his own eyes burning.

“You know you’re my whole world,” he whispered, his own voice cracking when he felt the cold trickle of her tears against his neck. “Without you I’d have no light, no stars, no air. You’re the only home I’ve ever known, and a life shared with you is the only one I ever want to live."

~

Kylo didn’t sleep that night. Lying in the dark with Rey cradled against him, he couldn’t even close his eyes. He’d held her and stroked her hair until she fell asleep, but even after she drifted into relaxed peace, he kept struggling to swallow around the feeling that he had already failed her. 

How could he give her everything, be everything she needed, when he’d failed to recognize this loss she still carried with her? How could he be a good husband, when he had fallen utterly powerless at the first instance of his future wife’s unhappiness?

Because he’d always seen her as the stronger one, perhaps part of him had come to think of her as invulnerable. He hated himself now for his surprise; Disappointed in himself that he’d meant to keep her safe and untroubled always, and yet had entirely failed to see her deepest hurt – much less protect her from it.

He had been blind, and now he was powerless. He would have done anything, whatever it took to ease her mourning for absent parents and the injury of abandonment. But for all his promises, all his wealth and influence, there wasn’t a thing he could do to change her past. The anger that boiled within him towards the thoughtless, contemptible two people who had abandoned Rey in childhood, and towards the world that had let it happen – None of that could erase the mark it had left in her heart.

Kylo tried to think smaller – to let some semblance of logic filter in around the edges of his unrest. What had made Rey’s pain revive now? What had stoked it out into the open? Perhaps Kylo could find a way to make it so she never had to think on it; To rewrite the triggers that made her relive her past…

Their wedding. She had imagined her mother at their wedding. It was the thought of their wedding without any family that had struck at her old wounds. 

To his own helpless frustration, there was nothing he could do to make Rey’s parents resurface. Wherever they were – if they were even still alive – Rey knew no more about them than he. There was no hope of tracking them down.

Then, two people entered Kylo’s mind whose faces he’d long ago banished from his memory. The details returned and filled in more easily than he expected. His own emotions gave a roiling lurch once the memory of their voices flooded back. But after a moment, he found it little in comparison to the black tempest that had closed around him as he’d watched Rey cry. 

Rey moved against him in her sleep. She let out a soft noise, her brows drawing together against her dreams as she curled herself closer to him. Kylo’s arm tightened slightly around her, his sighing breath ghosting through her hair. 

He couldn’t touch her dreams, nor her past. But when it came to her present, her future – There, he would do everything in his meager power.

~

Rey woke up early, though only a short time after Kylo had finally drifted down into sleep. She woke feeling groggy, taking a slow moment to remember. 

Something had dried crusty beneath her eyes, and Kylo’s embrace seemed tighter than usual. Then she remembered the unfounded, unfair regret she had confessed to him. After that, her memory dissolved into miserable, blurry darkness – its only defining feature the failsafe circle of Kylo’s arms around her.

Then anger flooded in – At the long-absent parents who had no right to cause her pain anymore. No right to mar what had been an engagement of breathless delight. Then anger at herself, for letting it all break out of her.

She showered quickly and quietly, then dressed and gathered her things for the day before Kylo could wake. She didn’t know what to say to him.

 

Kylo missed his first meeting of the day without Rey to wake him. (She’d overtaken alarm duty ever since they’d started sharing his bed.) 

Hardly sparing a thought for the trade union meeting he’d missed, his anxious concern fixed only on Rey as he left his quarters. He passed through the canteen and several of the ship’s common areas on a circuitous route to the meeting with advertising he really couldn’t miss. He failed to catch a glimpse of her, and when he finally entered the conference room, she was absent from the table. 

While the advertising team jumped to their feet at his entrance, Kylo stared at Rey’s usual seat for a disorienting moment. Where could she be? Where had she gone off to so early from their bed, if not bustling back to work?

He drifted through the meeting, only half present. Today would have been the day Rey’s detailed note taking would have truly been useful. The advertising team pitched him good ideas, but nothing that ingrained itself fully in his attention or memory. He knew Rey would have had the suggestions to turn their ideas into truly winning campaigns. 

While nodding and agreeing when appropriate, Kylo’s mind listed all the places he would look for Rey the minute the meeting ended.

An hour later, Kylo made sure to thank each team member (Rey’s coaxing to be more personable with his staff had truly taken root) before he hurried from the room.

Rey’s office was located several floors up, attached to his larger studio space. He hadn’t seen her in any of the common areas, so it was the next place on his list. He was stopped several times on his way by assistants needing signatures or accountants needing approvals. Not so long ago, Kylo would have simply waved them all off as nuisances, if he had an important destination in mind. But the way they approached him with tentative smiles, with a respectful “Excuse me, sir” rather than a timid one, made him incapable of treating them with such dismissiveness. 

He had just disentangled from a junior design assistant, when he recognized the faces of Rey’s finance friends in the corridor a short ways ahead. They both saw him coming and immediately straightened up, their chatter breaking off and expressions growing serious.

“Lis. Nora. Do you know where Rey is? Have either of you seen her today?”

Both women shook their heads, their mouths needing an extra moment to produce words.

“Sorry, sir. We haven’t,” Nora replied, an irrepressible blush rising on her face from the unexpected encounter. “Is… everything alright? She’s almost always with you.”

“Yes, yes, should be alright. I’ve simply lost track of her schedule today.”

He bustled on, leaving Lis and Nora open-mouthed in his wake. He finally made it to the elevator, where he entered the access codes for the upper level where his private studio and Rey’s office were tucked away. 

When the office doors slid open, Kylo finally breathed a sigh of relief. Rey was seated at her desk. Facing away from the door, her shoulders were hunched over and her head bowed low over the papers she was scribbling across. Accustomed to Rey’s detailed and meticulous scheduling, he wasn’t used to not knowing where she was at any given moment of the day. He didn’t much like the experience. 

“Rey. I’ve been looking for you all morning…”

She straightened, but didn’t fully turn at the sound of his voice. He came into the room, her eyes finally finding him as he came up beside her desk. 

“I’ve just been here,” she stated vaguely, waving a hand above the papers spread out before her. Kylo waited a beat, but Rey offered nothing further.

“Why did you leave so early this morning?” he asked, trying to keep his tone gentle, rather than letting it betray his unease. “After last night…”

“I’m fine,” Rey said quickly, her gaze skirting back down to the desk. “I just wanted to get to work as usual. It’s a very busy week and-…”

“So that’s why you skipped the advertising meeting?”

Rey’s mouth pressed together tightly, her gaze pulling farther away towards the other side of the room.

“I apologize, sir. I won’t be negligent like that again.”

Kylo blinked, feeling just as stunned and disoriented as he would if someone had opened one of the ship’s air locks right beside where he stood.

“Rey,” he whispered, chiding in a hush. 

She let out a rough, shaky breath. She closed her eyes for a moment, knowing she’d been childish. This was no way to handle a challenging, sensitive topic with the man she intended to marry.

“I’m sorry,” Rey admitted, her voice opening by degrees. “I was just so frustrated with myself this morning for doing this to you. For making problems for us where, by all rights, there really shouldn’t be any.”

After a moment of thought and watching her while she still didn’t turn to face him fully, Kylo squared his shoulders. He stepped closer to her chair and kneeled down beside her. Her eyes finally searched out his face, while his hands sought out hers in her lap. 

To his immense relief, her fingers twined around his hands and squeezed in return. 

“Please don’t apologize. There would only be a problem if you hadn’t felt that you could be honest with me.” 

Rey was clutching tight to Kylo’s hands now, finally looking right at him with quavering eyes.

“You were so patient with me last night. I’m sorry I disappeared this morning… I just didn’t know how to face in the daylight how I’d broken down.”

Kylo gave her hands a gentle squeeze. “Now that I know how you feel, maybe we can fix it.”

Rey let out a single dry hah of skeptical laughter. “Try tracking down people who are probably dead by now? No, our wedding planning shouldn’t be derailed by that fool’s errand…”

Kylo shook his head slowly. Rey fell silent, watching him with a mixture of confusion and interest.

“I’m afraid there’s no conceivable, practical means to find your parents. It pains me to be so helpless in that regard. But, when it comes to inviting a mother and father to the wedding, there might be something I can do…”

Rey’s brow furrowed, staring at him for several long seconds while she worked out the implications. They dawned slowly. Once the first rays of light reached her mind, Rey gaped at him.

“You mean… you’re still in touch with your family? But… I’ve never seen you communicate with anyone, not in these entire three years. And you never speak about your parents…”

Kylo averted his gaze down to their entwined hands, taking a moment before he began to explain. It felt unaccountably strange to be talking about this, as if he were groping for words to describe a past life that existed only in shadow.

“I haven’t spoken to either of them in over ten years. Mother tried sending occasional transmissions during the first few years after I left but… there was nothing to say.”

Stunned, Rey just stared at him for a long moment, speechless. She didn’t understand at all. She could never have imagined it was a choice that had separated him from his own family. She had never imagined Kylo’s parents were still out there somewhere, alive and well and trying to reach him… 

“What happened?” she asked softly and simply, yet the strain in her voice exposed her wondering skepticism: What could have been so bad to be irreparable?

One side of Kylo’s mouth curled in grim understanding. He understood now how she longed for reconnection with the spectral parents who had abandoned her to a lonely childhood and a life of toil. How could he explain that he’d had to leave his family of his own accord?

“There were… expectations that couldn’t be met – on either side. And there was a lot of anger, between my father and me. Let’s just say… I couldn’t be what they wanted me to be, and they had trouble accepting that.”

There were about a hundred questions desperately struggling to leap from Rey’s throat, but she bit down on them hard. She watched Kylo’s gaze drop further, all the way to the floor, and sensed that was all he was ready to say.

Rey wanted to respect that this was clearly difficult for him to talk about, but she’d been so utterly unprepared. Her chest felt tight and panicked. In the sudden crash of this moment, the collapse of this discovery - She couldn’t reconcile.

“I don’t understand…” she said, small and wavering. Kylo’s head cocked back upward at the distress in her voice. He tightened his hands over hers.

But a moment later, she drew them away and rose from the chair. Kylo’s heart seized in terror.

Rey’s mouth pressed into a hard, wobbling line and her eyes glistened. “How… How could you? No matter what they did or didn’t do, however they misunderstood… You had parents who gave a damn about you. A mother who kept trying to reach you. I know that I don’t know anything about relationships with parents, but… I do know about having none, having no relationship at all and… there is nothing worse. Not even nearly.”

Kylo rose to his feet. “Rey…”

“I can’t.” She closed her eyes tightly, shaking her head. Kylo could only begin to reach a hand out towards her, before she whirled and rushed for the elevator.

Listening to the whirr of the elevator descending to the lower levels, Kylo’s hand lowered slowly back to his side.

Twice. Two days in a row, he’d seen her cry. This time had certainly been his fault. He should have anticipated how his past would sound to her, after all she’d lost before she could even begin to experience it. He should have thought of a better way…

But from a certain view, hadn’t the night before been his fault as well? Again, he’d failed to anticipate how she might feel – Planning a wedding with no family. 

If he continued to fail like this, how could he ever hope to make her happy?

 

The moment the elevator doors slid shut, guilt welled up to choke her. Rey slumped against the wall, paying no attention to where the elevator was heading. Her eyes saw only the sight of Kylo standing there, frozen and alone, aborted in the motion of reaching out to her. Rey’s hands trembled, fighting to reach the button that would carry her back up to him, where her hands could fill the empty spaces between his fingers.

But her heart, still pounding in bewildered shock, wouldn’t let her.

He couldn’t have really… How could it be possible? Rey had never been able to imagine the kind of person who would ever discard family. How could anyone be so unforgiving? What in the entire world could ever be more important? How could anyone justify turning their backs? How could Kylo be someone who…

No. She couldn’t believe it. It couldn’t be. 

 

Despite, or perhaps because of, the turmoil that had engulfed her, Rey had to keep a level head. She let the routine problems of work fill her mind, pushing out her own unrest. She knew she couldn’t skip another meeting.

Rey was first to arrive at her and Kylo’s single shared meeting of the afternoon. She forced a smile and made obligatory small talk with the external auditors. Rey did her best to distract herself with the finance portfolios she drew from her bag and spread out on the table in preparation for Kylo’s arrival. 

She’d been going over the accounts with the finance team for the past two weeks and she knew them all almost by heart. She’d meant to go over them with Kylo today, considering that he hadn’t wanted to be bothered with the extra finance meetings. As he so often did, he had relied on Rey to manage the practical operations tasks so onerous for a creative mind. Such was her role, after all: She helped him shoulder the burdens of his role. 

If not for the First Order’s spotless track record in every previous audit, it would have made Rey nervous that she wasn’t at her best today. But their record was perfect, and Rey knew there wasn’t a single inconsistency or smudged figure to be found anywhere in the books.

Kylo appeared ten minutes late, with hurried apologies and a gaunt expression. He didn’t look too closely at Rey, not forcing eye contact, but her heart twisted of its own accord. Just sitting on the opposite side of the table from him felt like a horrible distance.

Rey did most of the talking. She let her professional decorum speak for her, using numbers and figures to ground her thoughts and speech so she didn’t tumble into the dark, confused chasm twisting through her. She was glad the auditors didn’t know them; That they didn’t recognize how out of character it was for she and Kylo to go the whole meeting without meeting each other’s eyes or barely addressing one another.

“Rey, could you pull last year’s numbers from the Atterra system?”

The only direct thing he asked her was clipped in a distanced, professional tone. 

“Of course, sir,” she replied mechanically.

Rey felt her heart sinking as she flipped through files on the projection screen. His tone had been exactly proper for the founder of a galaxy-wide business empire speaking to his Personal Assistant. 

But it was entirely wrong for them. Rey could barely remember a time when they had ever spoken to each other with such detachment. And she could barely envision a time when they ever world. 

 

Rey ended her day early. When she found their living quarters empty, she sat down in the small kitchen and spread some paperwork over the table, even if just for something to stare at while waiting for him. 

When the soft beep of entry access sounded and the door slid open, Kylo froze only mere steps into the room when he saw Rey sitting at the table. His mouth opened and closed a few times, and Rey almost expected smoke to start rising from his head in his struggle for words. 

“I-I’ll find somewhere else…” he mumbled vaguely, giving up and beginning to turn back towards the door.

“No.” The chair shrieked against the floor in Rey’s haste to rise. “I want to talk. I’m… ready to talk.” 

Kylo froze mid-turn. He remained in place for a moment, before turning back towards Rey. 

Rey needed a moment to decide where she wanted to start – How she could begin to pick apart the complicated, heavy knot in her chest that needed to be resolved with understanding and acceptance of Kylo’s situation. While she debated, she watched Kylo peel his gloves off, one after the other, then move to lay them down on the kitchen counter. 

And then, in a rare, unexpected moment, he beat her to the point of speech. 

“I’m sorry, Rey. I thought too simply. No other set of parents, no matter who’s they are, can ever simply replace what you lost. I didn’t appreciate the loss you suffered – that it’s still with you today. This was just about the worst time to tell you about my own family, just about the worst circumstances… I should have considered how hard it would be for you to hear, especially now. I’m so sorry to have caused you pain.”

Rey fell speechless for a long moment, unable to do anything but stare. She stared at the way Kylo uneasily shifted his weight from foot to foot – The way he roughly sucked one lip behind his teeth and how his jaw went tense, the way his eyes darted uncomfortably around the room, seeming unable to look right at her.

And then Rey stopped thinking, overcome. 

She rushed forward and threw her arms around him. She buried her face against his shoulder, even while at first he didn’t move, stunned. 

She couldn’t believe there had ever been a time when she thought of him as egotistical.

And Rey knew - it wasn’t that he had changed. This had always been the truest part of him. He often didn’t know how to express it, or kept it wrapped under the guise of a disinterested exterior, but everything he did stemmed from this most essential desire to fix and create and improve from his own faults – and those of the wider world that too often stripped it of its beauty.

She felt one of his hands press tremulously to her back, fingers spread and hesitant. Rey closed her eyes tightly, pressing her face in tight against his neck. 

How could she have thought…? It wasn’t in his nature to destroy.

“No, I’m the one who’s sorry,” Rey avowed, clutching him more tightly, apologizing with both words and touch. “I shouldn’t have just walked out like that. You were trying to help, even though it wasn’t easy for you. I should have let you explain.”

Rey pulled back to look up at him. His gaze was glued to her, hopeful and yet still harboring something frightened and nervous. Rey swallowed hard as she reached her hands down to take both of his. How could she have been so thoughtlessly cruel to him?

“I think we both assumed our pasts were the same. I never considered you might have had to leave your family, and I suppose it surprised you that I still mourn mine.” Rey paused, swallowing through another surge of guilt as she remembered he had only broached the subject of his past in the hope of easing her pain regarding her own. 

“But it doesn’t matter. I’m ready to listen now. That is, if you’d still like to tell me,” she murmured. “And I promise, no more assumptions.”

Kylo’s expression remained still for a moment, until Rey felt one of his thumbs stroke across the back of her hand. He didn’t quite smile, but some of the troubled shadows cleared from his face. Now, he mostly looked apprehensive of the impending discussion.

“Let’s sit down. Explaining will take a while.”

Rey nodded and clutched his hand tightly as she followed him through to the bedroom. Relief warmed her chest, banishing a bit of her guilt, as he still seemed willing to open up to her. 

She pulled his hand into her lap once he perched on the edge of the bed, Rey curled cross-legged beside him. He stared at the floor, before his gaze crawled upwards to rest on his own hand, cradled between both of Rey’s. Rey stayed quiet, waiting until he was ready. She was determined to make this right – To be here for him, every bit that he had been here for her the night before, right here in their bed. 

Kylo wandered silently in distant fragments of memories. He did his best to trace their paths back to the boy he’d once been – to the past life he’d turned away from and let fall away into shadow.

Never before had he called that boy back into being with words spoken aloud. He shifted his focus to the soft warmth of Rey’s hands – to the caring patience in her eyes. Kylo took a deep breath and let it fill him, letting in the equanimity to endure that boy’s presence. 

“I left home when I was 16, and I knew I was never going back. There had to be a choice between my parents’ world or my own. My life in their world – it was miserable. I grew up in the shadow of their success. Of course I wanted for nothing, compared to how you were forced to live on Jakku… but sometimes I felt like I was starving, entirely invisible to them. They saw only what they wanted to see in me, and didn’t know what to do with the rest. They never said it, but I knew: I wasn’t the son they wanted.” 

Already, Kylo fell silent. His brow furrowed and his mouth tightened in distant thought, eyes staring unseeingly at his hand still cradled in Rey’s lap. 

After a long moment of silence, Rey gently coaxed him on, “What do you mean – You had to choose between your parents’ world and your own? They couldn’t accept that you wanted to be different from them?”

“Let’s just say, my parents were quite used to… succeeding. I must have been their most frustrating challenge – Something that didn’t go according to plan, and was beyond their power to change. ”

Kylo closed his eyes and heaved a deep sigh. Rey watched him in silence, as he looked to be debating something internally, then seemed to resign himself to some grim endeavor. His shoulders hunched inwards as he leaned forward towards her slightly. His eyes opened again with a serious set, as if he were about to march into an open battlefield. 

“I didn’t want to get into this, it’s been so long… But it wouldn’t be fair for me not to tell you. I don’t think you could really understand otherwise. Especially since I offered to invite them…”

His jaw set in grim focus, Kylo moved his other hand to Rey’s lap. He encircled Rey’s hands in both of his own, to reassure her and anchor himself. A childish, frightened part of him wanted to ask her to promise this wouldn’t change anything. But he knew she couldn’t really agree to that until she knew. 

He took a breath to calm his racing heart, then took the plunge.

“You see, I changed my name when I left home. I don’t think anyone knows my birth name, and that’s how I wanted it. When I began my first job for Snoke, I was known only as Kylo Ren. My parents’ names… They don’t let you create anything for yourself.”

Rey listened with rapt attention now, leaning forward for each word. She could feel him forcing the words out, despite how heavy they were in his throat. She could feel the slightest tremor in his hands where they cradled hers. His explanation was shaping up to be bigger and messier than anything she had imagined, and her heart quickened in pace as she realized how anxious she was to hear his retelling to its end.

Kylo lifted his eyes to hers, finally. A timid, rueful smile twisted the corners of his lips. He knew he’d already gone too far to turn back. Now he could only see this through, and pray it wouldn’t cause disaster. When he spoke, his voice came out steady but entirely flat. Without inflection or bitterness, he simply stated what had been. It had been so long, the passions and anger that used to surround the name had long frozen and peeled away like scabs over old wounds over pink skin. The name was simply words, now. 

“My birth name was Ben. Ben Solo.”

Rey looked puzzled, before her mouth fell open in slow, disbelieving recognition. Then her eyes began to grow in dawning shock.

“Solo? You don’t mean… as in… the Rebellion General?”

Now Kylo smiled grimly. He nodded with dour acceptance.

“Or the smuggler – depending on who you ask. But either way, they would all call him the same name: Han Solo.”

Her eyes still wide and expression locked in blank shock, Rey’s voice seemed to drift from her almost robotically, “But… Then, your mother…”

“My mother is Leia Organa, Senator of the New Republic. I was born nine years after the fall of the Empire, which they helped bring about. My whole childhood, no one would let me forget that. Not for a single day. No matter how much time passed, that was always the most important part of their lives, and it always would be. It was something I could never share – and yet it defined every aspect of my childhood and all I could ever hope to be, as Ben Solo.”

Rey was stunned speechless. Her mouth parted, instinctively knowing something needed to be said into the towering void of Kylo’s revelation. But her mouth couldn’t seem to create sound at all.

Even in the backwater trading outposts on Jakku, she’d heard stories of Princess Leia, Han Solo, and Luke Skywalker, whose heroics had ended the Empire’s reign and sent star destroyers plummeting down into the sands of Jakku. 

The closest Rey had ever thought she’d come to that mythical history were the parts she’d scavenged in her youth from shelled-out AT-AT walkers and skeletal ship ruins. 

Of course, her heart thudded with awe at unexpectedly encountering the presence of legends, right in the middle of her own life. But that didn’t account for all of the shock that seemed to have frozen her from head to toe.

She had been asking herself all day how it came to pass that she and Kylo had spent three years of their lives together without their pasts coming to light. It seemed impossible. She’d come to know and love him so deeply that she couldn’t imagine living her life anywhere other than at his side; And yet she had spent all this time clueless to something as simple as his birth name.

Certainly, if Kylo had changed his name in resentment of his heritage, he had chosen to leave his past in irrelevance. He might never have told her at all. The single rational corner of Rey’s brain still in working order pointed out quite reasonably that this changed nothing. She would marry him all the same, whether he had told her or not. 

It was simply… a terrible jolt. To crash so unexpectedly into an entire unknown part of him which Rey could never have guessed. To realize that, long ago, he’d been someone she might not even recognize. 

“Kylo…,” she breathed, her voice still wavering at the edge of disbelief. “How could you never think to tell me this?”

Kylo shrugged, looking away despondently.

“It’s not who I am anymore. It hasn’t been for a long time. And I suppose… I didn’t want you to see me any differently.”

Rey realized then, her hands had gone almost numb. She shifted them in her lap, curling her fingers around Kylo’s wide palms and feeling the comforting, familiar warmth of his skin. Just as warm as his hands had always been.

She thought back to the kitchen – to how he had apologized first, even though she’d been the one to make a hasty, close-minded judgment earlier today. 

He had volunteered the topic of his past despite its difficulty to him, only in the hope of it being a means to bring Rey comfort. She had mistaken him once already. She wouldn’t do so again.

She would prove to herself that she did know him, through and through; And to him that he need never again doubt the constancy of what she felt for him. 

Rey untangled one hand from her lap and raised it to cup his face. With gentle, slow brushes, her thumb dipped along the familiar pattern of moles across his cheek, like a stone skipping across water – leaving nothing but the most gentle ripples.

Then she held still until Kylo managed to stop his gaze from fleeing around the room – until he could muster the strength to look at her.

Rey smiled. Gentle, reassuring, loving – and only for him.

“Kylo.” Relief began to dawn in him when she still spoke the name with every bit of feeling and trust. “Kylo, there isn’t a thing that could happen, past, present or future, to make me feel any differently for you. For better or for worse, I will always love you.”

Kylo blinked slowly. Against her palm, Rey felt his jaw tense and then tremble slightly. Then she felt the slow release of his held breath flutter along her skin. His shoulders sagged the slightest bit in released suspension, his whole wide body curling closer to her in consolation. 

He lifted one hand from Rey’s lap to lay his fingers over hers against his cheek. She could tell from the way his eyes sparkled, fixed on her as if he never intended to look away, that her words had resolved him entirely. He needed nothing further. And within her own chest, the disoriented chasm that had first cracked open the night before knitted tightly and seamlessly together again.

The details were immaterial. Whatever or whoever they had been before they met – None of it held any importance to their life together, here and now. All that mattered was that their individual journeys had brought them to the point of finding each other; To the point where all that had come before fit and joined together in perfect symmetry.

“Although, it’s maybe a bit intimidating…” Rey mused playfully, basking in the resurgent fulfillment unfolding through her as she traced a thumb along Kylo’s bottom lip. “You’re not only the most successful designer there’s ever been in the history of the galaxy, but you’re also the son of legends? I mean, doesn’t being Leia Organa’s son mean you’re technically royalty?”

Kylo made a face as if he’d just been force-fed sour bantha milk. “Technically, if Alderaan still existed, I would have been a prince, yes. But I think my father’s backwater smuggler blood diluted all that out well enough. Still, none of it changes a thing. Titles, bloodlines… It’s all just vapid pretensions. I always thought so. Father was amused by that, but Mother less so…” 

“Wait!” Rey exclaimed, her hand pulling back in sudden excitement. “Does this mean you have Skywalker lineage as well?”

Kylo groaned, letting his forehead slump down against Rey’s shoulder as he sighed dramatically. 

“Yes, to my unending duress and pressure as a child, it does. I think I must have wasted a full year of my childhood trying in vain to use Force powers. The few times I remember seeing my uncle Luke before he disappeared, I begged him to teach me. It was for the best, though, that I never exhibited Force sensitivity.”

Rey went quiet for a moment, thinking. With Kylo still draped against her shoulder, one hand moved automatically to the back of his neck. Her thumb rubbed across the pale skin there, usually covered by his hair. 

“Perhaps you do. Even at the risk of inflating your ego – I’ll go ahead and state the obvious that you’re an artistic and design genius. You think of outlandish, impossible ideas no one before could ever have dreamt – And you never seem to run out of inspiration. Perhaps… the Force grants many different types of powers.”

“Perhaps…” Kylo agreed half-heartedly, drawing out the word. 

Once he’d reached adolescence, he’d given up his fixation with the mystical power of his heritage that had turned out a fanciful waste of time, like his father always said. By that time, he’d had plenty of other, more pressing challenges: Trying to get through a single day without fighting with his father; Minding the house while his mother traveled for Senate business; Enduring youth Senate summits of which he hated every last minute; Pretending to perform poorly in his father’s starship races so Han might stop pressuring him to become a pilot; Filling his first sketch books in secret and hiding them where his parents wouldn’t see.

He had quickly forgotten about the Force, once Luke disappeared in search of the first Jedi temple and was never heard from again. At that point, Kylo had already known it was only his own hard work and resolve that would get him anywhere. 

Some mystical Force was no use to him – Just another heavy legacy like those laid on him by his mother and father. It gave him nothing he could prize as his own achievement, nothing he could create with his own hands.

“Honestly, I doubt the Force really has much to do with it. You know you are my inspiration, and my greatest works only began after you came into my life.”

Rey’s lips pinched to the side in thought.

“There were plenty of other show assignments I could have taken, instead of yours where we met. But that’s the one I chose. I told myself I wanted the challenge, since I’d heard you were the most difficult to work with.” When he gave an obligatory hum of indignation, she just swatted his hair in response. “Since then, I’ve wondered several times what would have become of me, if I hadn’t met you that day and accepted your offer. But I did. Thank the stars, I did.”

Rey wrapped her arms all the way around Kylo’s shoulders as he fell silent in thought.

With her arms curled around the broad expanse of his shoulders and his head resting against her, Rey remembered the sight of him striding in to the Jakku exhibition hall as if he owned the place, his dusty black coattails whirling around his ankles. His presence had instantly filled the room – Presumptuous and aloof, but the cut of his brow so intense Rey’s pulse had rushed with the instinct to spar with him.

Really, ever since the moment she laid eyes on him, there had been very little question of choice.

“Maybe the Force works in more ways than we know.”

 

An hour later found them relaxed and half-naked in bed, having made up for the stilted day with drifting kisses, quiet jokes, and soothing caresses. 

(“You’re sure you can’t do that with the Force?” Rey had teased as Kylo’s hands peeled her shirt off. “Sure you don’t feel a little bit of the dark side in you?”

“I’ll show you the dark side,” he retorted before pressing her on her back beneath him.)

Once quiet settled through the bedroom, Rey’s fingers shaped patterns across Kylo’s bare chest as her thoughts began to unspool, relaxed and wondering.

“Do you really think you could bear it?” 

Kylo sat up slightly against the pillows, his arm curling farther around Rey’s waist in silent quest for clarification.

“Seeing your parents, I mean.”

“Oh.”

Kylo slid back into the pillows, gazing up at the ceiling. 

“Sorry,” Rey said hastily, leaning up on an elbow to see his face. “I didn’t mean to presume… Of course, I can forget you ever said anything.”

“No, no, it’s alright.” Kylo shifted onto his side so he could look at her more clearly. He lifted a hand to trace the shape of her cheek, before letting it fall to rest on her arm. “I understand that no matter what, getting married will remind you of the family you lost. But, if you think that sharing my family might help…, then yes, I think I could bear it.”

Rey bit her lip for a moment. Not because she felt any shred of conflict anymore, but rather because she felt none, and she wasn’t sure how to put the newfound clarity into words.

To begin, she leaned close to press her lips to his. Her mouth held him close for an extended moment, before she pulled back just enough to see his eyes. When his eyes opened, his gaze darted upwards in jagged unfocus. 

“Before we talk about this, I want you to understand what I came to realize today, after you told me about your parents. It makes no difference to me where you came from before, just as I know if makes no difference to you that I’m a backwater world nobody.”

She saw his lips immediately part to speak, but she laid a finger against them as she continued, “All that matters is now. Us. Creating our future together. Nothing has the power to ruin that. In you, I found my belonging, and all the family I’ll ever need. There will not be a single thing missing, not a single thing to mourn or compensate for, on the day we get married. I…I want you to understand that, before we even talk about…”

Kylo’s hands cupped her face as he surged upwards to kiss her. Just as her last kiss had wrapped him in a reassuring, loving promise – Now he enveloped her in reciprocal understanding. 

“I know, Rey,” he murmured between kisses two and three, “I know.” He kissed her once more in a rush of stunned awe – That he had somehow brought so much to Rey’s life, when she seemed the source of everything bright and good in his own. 

Satisfied by the fulfillment in his eyes and the love she tasted in his mouth, Rey settled down against him again, curled close. 

“The day you left - That was the last time you saw them?”

She felt Kylo nod against the top of her head. His arms encircled her and linked together against her hip.

“Aside from the few holos my mother tried to send. You know,… if I didn’t invite her to my wedding, I’d probably lose any chance of ever speaking to her again. She’d never forgive that.”

Buried deep, Rey swore she could hear an unconscious, enduring affection in his voice. If their wedding could help heal a splintered family…

“What happened when you left?”

Kylo let out a sigh, long and thoughtful. He took a moment to consider and remember.

“On the day I left… I broke my father’s nose and most likely my mother’s heart. I had finally told them - after hiding it for years - that I wanted to work in design. You can probably imagine how well Han Solo took the news that his only son wanted to be a fashion designer, rather than a starship racer in his precious Five Saber leagues. Mother was disappointed too, of course, that I wouldn’t take up her legacy in politics, but Han… He never said it directly, but it humiliated him.

“He didn’t want to let me go, when I said I could get a job in Snoke’s company. He said some things… I don’t recall the words anymore, but the gist being that no son of his would ever be a useless seamstress. Mother knew he had gone too far, but… she still had trouble supporting something so unexpected. When she looked at me, I remember thinking I saw disappointment; That they’d offered me so much potential and I’d squandered it. But they never understood – I needed to create my own potential, and I never wanted to be a politician or a pilot.

“And so, I couldn’t stay. I would never be any of the things they wanted, and every time they looked at me they would only be reminded of how I’d failed them. All that was left was for me to build something brand new, and finally leave behind all the baggage Ben Solo was born with.

“Except… Han couldn’t stand aside. He was convinced it would all blow over, that it was just a phase while I was a teenager. And Mother was desperate, so she didn’t stop him… 

“It was the first time I was truly ready to live honestly. I had my pack already on my back… and then my father stood in the doorway, not letting me leave. And I was just so angry…”

Kylo paused for a moment, words stalling. He found himself taken aback by how vividly the memory replayed before his eyes.

“There was shouting. My mother started crying. I knew already, we could never go back from that day. To escape, I hit him square in the nose and I ran. I haven’t seen either of them since.”

Rey’s breathing had gone shallow where she listened against Kylo’s shoulder.

“Oh, Kylo,” she breathed, curling closer around him and tucking her head in close beneath his chin. 

She couldn’t even imagine how difficult it all must have been for him. In her youth, waiting endlessly for her parents to return and correct whatever mistake had made them leave her – She realized she had never really thought of them as real people she may or may not have gotten along with. 

In the barren sands of Jakku, where the days crawled by with backbreaking work just to survive and the nights were so silent she might have been alone in the universe, she had been so starved for comfort and company, she might have loved blindly anyone who laid claim to her.

Now, after working her way to stand on her own two legs, and finding in Kylo all the purpose, belonging, and appreciation for who she was as an individual – She suddenly found herself looking back less idealistically towards the fantasy family she might have had.

She couldn’t say she knew what it felt like, to grow up with parents blind or disparaging of who she was. But after listening to his explanation, she thought that in a way, he knew what it felt like to be discarded.

“What did your mother say, when she tried to reach you?”

“That she was sorry, that Han was sorry, and they just wanted to hear that I was alright, even if I wasn’t coming home.”

“And you never replied?”

“No… I was just starting at Snoke’s company, and it was all too fresh for me to think of any reply that wasn’t guided by anger. But the anger never faded into forgiveness. I just… moved on. By that time, the First Order had launched and I was visible in media coverage. Obviously, changing my name wouldn’t stop them from recognizing me, so I told myself they could see if they cared to, and there was no need to contact them anymore.”

Rey shifted against him slightly. Her fingers stroked idly along his collarbone as she thought.

“Have you ever thought about what you might say to them?”

Kylo slid a hand up and back down Rey’s back, staring at the ceiling.

“Can’t say I have. Now and then… Whenever Senate delegations come by for one reason or another, I do wonder if Mother had a part in organizing them; And if the reason she never came herself was because she respects that I moved on, or because she doesn’t want to see me.”

“I can’t imagine she doesn’t want to see you. And I’m not just saying that because… because it took me so long to consider that my own Mother might not have wanted to see me anymore.”

Rey lifted herself up just enough so she could look down into Kylo’s face. Kylo lifted a hand to brush her hair back where the longer strands fell against his face.

“She reached out, Kylo. She apologized. You said she tried twice. She probably realized then that she would just drive you away, if she kept trying before you were ready. But then too much time passed. You grew up, and she didn’t know what she could say anymore.” 

“Neither do I.”

Kylo let his head drop back against the pillows, gazing away towards the doorway going off to the kitchen. 

Finally, he admitted faintly, “I never decided that I never wanted to see them again.” 

In silent support of his honesty with himself, Rey retook her place against his chest. Her head settling in the crook of his neck, she silently waited for him to continue, whenever he was ready. One of her hands squeezed his shoulder gently.

Finally he went on, musing pathways aloud he had never dared to tread on his own. 

“I suppose it just seemed impossible once the First Order took off. I didn’t know how to acknowledge the life I used to have. I never want to go back to the person I used to be… He was so unhappy, so unfulfilled and so angry. I’m worried the anger will return, if I see my father again.”

“But you’ve come so far since then,” Rey said, softly but fiercely. “You’re stronger, calmer. And you’ve built yourself. You are your own man; There’s nothing your father can take from you or change about you. Besides…” Rey nuzzled closer against Kylo’s neck, smiling slightly to herself, “You’ve become so much better at keeping level-headed. I can’t even remember the last time you threw a tantrum about something, which is really a credit to you.”

Kylo’s mouth pinched in affront. “I do not throw tantrums.”

“Oh? Hmm, give me a minute to think…” Rey paused just long enough for dramatic effect. “Ah yes, the last one was when that Hapan journal published that terrible review of last year’s formal line. We still posted top sale numbers, of course, but you really lost your head about that one.”

Kylo’s instinct to argue stalled when his tongue found nothing to say in defense.

“I was… rather irked by that low-brow, foolish critic.”

Rey snorted in skepticism, but otherwise gave no retort that he’d been a great deal more than just ‘irked.’ She let it go. 

“That’s not the point. The point is…” Rey propped herself up again to find his eyes and capture his gaze. The fingers that had been resting upon his chest slid gently up his neck to span across his jaw, then turned to brush along the side of his face. “I believe in you. If you decide to invite them – and the decision really is entirely yours – I know that you’ll be able to face them. After all you’ve become for me, understanding me and what I need, I’m sure that you could tell you mother you’ve missed her and your father to step off.”

A small but unconscious smile touched Kylo’s lips despite his apprehension. 

“Sometimes I think you understand me too well.”

Rey just grinned down at him. “Caught me.”

Spellbound, Kylo reached up to trace the shape of Rey’s grin. 

The world was suddenly very simple, and impossibly beautiful. He wanted to see that smile forever – every day for the rest of his life. It was worth anything and everything in the galaxy, and any challenge paled before it.

Kylo cupped Rey’s cheek in his broad palm.

“We’re going to invite them. I’ll plan a meeting beforehand for you to meet them, where we’ll account for the years and try to remedy the bad terms on which I left. Then, we’ll have family there when we marry.”

Rey bit her lip in attempt to contain the smile that wanted to escape. She studied his face for a long moment, searching for gaps. 

“Are you sure, Kylo? Are you really sure? Please don’t do this only for me…”

“I’m sure. It’s for both of us. With you, I do know that I can face this – face them. It’s… something I should have done years ago. But now, our wedding is the perfect joyous reason to see them again. We’ll have something other than mistakes of the past bringing us all together.”

Rey’s smile slipped out little by little. Kylo’s own lips tipped upwards in helpless reflection. In her head, Rey imagined the soft applause that would echo far-off in her ears when Kylo pulled her close and kissed the lips of his wife for the first time. She imagined turning in his arms to see the family she now shared with him. 

She saw both of them side by side, two halves of a whole, and their marriage the healing resolution of childhoods splintered by loneliness. 

Rey dropped back down to burrow against his side, and this time didn’t plan to move again. Once her eyes drifted closed, she felt Kylo shift and stretch until the bedroom lights blinked off. That was when a final alarming thought struck Rey in full.

“Oh, hell. I’m going to have to meet Senator Organa and General Solo.”

She felt the breath of Kylo’s chuckle as he settled back down against her. 

“That you will. But you’re fearless, and I promise they’re not nearly as formidable as you’re imagining.”

Rey huffed, “Of course their kid would never be impressed.” 

He hushed her with a poorly aimed kiss in the dark. 

“You’ll be their daughter-in-law soon enough. That means you can’t be impressed by them either.” 

Rey fell silent as that strange title slowly sunk in. She was still silent, after Kylo’s breathing had evened out and his arms had gone relaxed around her. Her fingers shifted to find the spaces between his and slide into place. 

She felt warmer than she could ever remember.

 

“This is your last chance.”

Rey paused at the doorway, taking a moment to set her bag and all her files down. She had only worked half the day but been busier than usual, handling account approvals herself since she’d cleared Kylo’s whole schedule for today, as soon as the date was set. 

As soon as her final meeting ended, she’d known she would find him here – In the viewing level overlooking the Supremacy’s main hangar, where all incoming ships docked.

“Last chance for what?”

He still hadn’t turned from where he stood, gazing out through the glass. She could almost see the tense anxiety radiating from where he stood, his shoulders hunched inward. 

“To leave me and save yourself, before it’s too late.”

Rey laughed under her breath as she strode to his side. His arm came up around her shoulders as she tucked herself in against him. 

She simply gazed up at his profile for a long moment of silence, as he continued staring out over the hangar. She could see his eyes flickering across the huge expanse of docking stations beneath them, but the lurches back and forth gave away that he wasn’t really seeing a single thing – just trying to tamp down rising panic. 

“It was already too late a long time ago.”

Rey stretched up on her toes, using his frame to pull herself up, until she could press a firm kiss to his cheek. To her relief, she felt him relax slightly against her, some of the tension draining from his neck. But it wasn’t quite enough – his fingers were still tight where they held her shoulder, his jaw still tense.

Rey reached one hand up to cup his chin. She slowly tilted his head down towards her, then waited until his anxious eyes focused on her. She felt his arm tighten slightly around her. 

“You’re not getting rid of me just like that. I’m with you, no matter what. It doesn’t make one bit of difference how today goes. ”

Slowly, she could see him finding the ground again. She watched the anxiety draining from his eyes, until he was truly there and present with her. When he finally reconnected, she was the brightest light in his universe. Her gravity held all else in place.

“I love you, Rey.”

It struck Rey like a blow to the chest as she realized this was the first time he had said it in those terms – hiding nothing.

Rey had to stiffen and set her own mouth to keep herself from floating off from the moment, overcome. She made herself focus on the feel of his smooth, shaved skin beneath her fingers, where she gently urged him to lean down closer. Even so, she still had to lift up on her toes to kiss his lips. 

“I love you, too.”

A beat later, the door behind them slid open again.

“Sir, Miss Rey – Your expected arrivals are here. They just docked in Gate 14.”

Kylo’s gaze darted there instantly. A nondescript, Senate-issued speeder was just being connected for refueling. Only First Order service crews seemed visible around it, but the distance was too far away to be sure. 

“Have them shown to the Reception Hall, if you would. Say we’ll be with them shortly.”

The door slid closed again. Kylo’s eyes hadn’t left the speeder. 

Giving him a gentle squeeze, Rey tried to unwind him again, “I might be slightly disappointed that they didn’t come in the Millennium Falcon.”

“That piece of junk was probably shot out of the sky by now, considering how many people are always after Han Solo for one reason or another.”

“Will he like it if I ask him about it?”

Kylo coughed a humorless laugh that barely left his throat. 

“Nothing would get you in his good graces faster.”

“Did you fly on it?”

“Of course. He lived half his life in that ship. Would have spent all his time there if Mother let him. Off the cuff repairs for that rust bucket were the only life skills he ever taught me.”

From the viewing level, they both watched a small group of First Order staff approach the speeder, then its door slowly open. 

They were too far to make out any faces, but Kylo drew breath all the same when two figures came down the walkway. 

Rey let her management instincts kick in, knowing she had to support his momentum. 

“Now, let’s go meet your parents.”

 

On their way to the Reception Hall, Rey suddenly found herself a hell of a lot more nervous than she had expected. She knew her own nerves hardly compared to Kylo’s, but she’d failed to fully realize before this moment just how desperately she wanted these people to like her. 

She wanted their approval not only for herself, but for the woman their son planned to marry. If they accepted her, then she could be the force enabling Kylo’s reunion with his family. He’d never known what to say to them, had never known how to address the fraught past. But with Rey between them all, that wouldn’t matter anymore; They would be free to build a new future. 

In the elevator, Rey fidgeted with her dress. She’d spent an uncharacteristic amount of time that morning choosing it. It was one of the first dresses Kylo had designed for her. Sleeveless, a soft beige that flattered her tan complexion, it flowed down her frame to flutter freely around her knees. Two wide sashes of diaphanous light pink fabric draped across her shoulders, crossed over her chest and back, then belted at her waist to dance in her wake when she walked.

Kylo noticed immediately.

“Rey.” He watched her until she finally stopped adjusting the shoulders and met his gaze. “I haven’t thought for a second that they’ll do anything but adore you.”

Rey shifted her weight, nodding in self-conscious gratitude. She wasn’t used to him reassuring her, and she felt silly that he’d had to do so – in this situation, of all times. 

Then the elevator doors opened.

 

The Reception Hall was a grand space, with one wall entirely windows to give the feel of an open-air hall where stars twinkled just beyond reach. This was where Kylo gave press interviews, or where he held meetings with competitors. The room both dazzled and intimidated. 

Leia Organa stood at the glass, gazing out at the view. Her husband stood at the opposite side of the room, watching the glimmering digital screens cascading across the wall, showcasing all the major fashion lines Kylo had launched in the past few years. Both of them jolted, heads turning in sync when the door opened and Kylo and Rey entered. 

The room between them was wide. But the moment Kylo, Leia, and Han laid eyes on each other, all distance, time, and obstacles blinked from existence. 

A short way behind Kylo, Rey was telling herself not to panic, because the full magnitude of the old Rebellion leaders she was currently in the room with had hit her only just now. But she didn’t have to worry just yet. For the moment, they only had eyes for their son.

Han and Leia had seen their son on countless holo broadcasts, accepting awards and giving interviews. Leia had watched more often than Han, when the ache of separation and guilt became too much. They had helped her, but only made it worse for Han. 

Although Leia had thought she knew her grown son’s face perfectly, seeing him with her own eyes for the first time in over ten years was like seeing a new dimension of being. 

Tears rushed up and over her. 

“Ben,” she breathed in an awed whisper that struck Kylo’s chest instantly. Leia remembered only then her previous resolve not to call him by his given name until he acquiesced to it. She couldn’t bring herself to fix the mistake. She couldn’t bring herself to do anything at all other than cross the room towards him. 

Kylo’s heart was racing with he didn’t know what. His mother came nearer and nearer, and his head was still reeling with the long-forgotten sound of her saying the name of his boyhood. 

The name he had loathed. But right now, he felt no disdain. He felt no anger. Looking into the face he would know anywhere, no matter the added lines of age, it was… natural; right that she should speak that name. 

By the same instinct of course, he replied, “Mother.” 

His voice was small and thin, wary of exposing too much.

Then Leia stood right before him, and what she couldn’t have prepared herself for was how tall he would be. He’d only just surpassed her when he left; Now, he stood several full heads above her. She couldn’t have prepared herself for the shaving shadow along his jaw and curving around his mouth. She could never have prepared herself for his eyes - the fact that they were exactly the same; The same light hazel eyes that had once blinked up at her from a bundle in her arms. 

Her hands reflexively lifted towards him – The part of her that had been cut away much too soon. She stopped herself just barely, only inches from placing her hands on his arms. 

Kylo had dressed in full Supreme Designer retinue. His trademark all-black ensemble was formal and complete, with a heavy cloak falling from his shoulders and gloves encasing his hands. The dramatic look intimidated most, but Leia saw only him. 

“May I?” she asked softly as she looked up at him, hands arrested in reach. A taut, fragile possibility had opened between them, but they both stood on thin lines above it. Leia knew any sudden action would send them falling.

She had lost him once as a result of her assumptions. Never would she make the same mistake again.

He nodded almost imperceptibly. When Leia still didn’t move, he offered a hushed, “Yes.”

Leia bit her lip to keep it from trembling. She reached up… up, up… and then her son was in her arms again. He didn’t all fit – not like he used to – but he was every good thing she could ever imagine. 

When Leia pulled him down into her embrace, Kylo didn’t go stiff like he was afraid he might. He had spent years of his life angry with this woman, wondering if there were any way she could have loved him more, or if being who he was simply made her love impossible. But the moment she touched him, everything shifted. 

He realized with a fright that he had forgotten her as she was. His bitter, injured memories had replayed only the way she’d stood to the side, the day he tried to leave and his father tried to stop him. His memory had been stuck in a pit of repetition – What he recalled as her disappointment, her inability to understand his resentment at having his future set for him.

He hadn’t remembered this. This warmth. This peace. 

And for a moment, he was angry with himself – Furious that he had let one-sided memories and bitterness dominate him for so long and keep him divided from this.

And then the anger passed. Carefully, he lifted one arm around her, almost afraid to hold too tight. He didn’t want to move too quickly, for fear of upsetting this blossoming wonder.

She held Kylo for what could have been an age to the two of them. In the true passing of time, it was not even a minute before Han had to approach as well. 

His pair of battered, scuffed boots sounded on the shined floor. Leia unwound her arms from their son and stepped back, stoically wiping tears out of the way. 

With one halting step after another, Han approached his son. 

His son who was a man now, tall and grown. His son who had become exactly what he wanted to be, and excelled at it beyond Han’s wildest imaginings – despite all of the opposition and hardship Han had thrown in his path.

His son, who now looked at him with the face of Han’s greatest regrets. But Han knew, this wasn’t about him. This wasn’t the time for making peace with himself – If that time ever did come at all. This was the time for something more important. 

Kylo watched warily as his father came closer. Han looked unsettled, completely overwrought at the sight of his son so close after so long.

To his relief, the anger Kylo had feared remained at bay. His father had aged. He’d gone almost entirely grey, and wrinkles had traversed the once carefree, heedless face. There was gravity in his eyes and deliberation in the set of his mouth that seemed wholly new. 

Kylo couldn’t yet place his own emotions at seeing his father’s face again, but he knew one thing absolutely: Han would have to speak first. 

Han finally reached Leia’s side. He dug for the impossible – Feeble words to set years of mistakes right. But he had to start somewhere.

“Son…” Kylo’s jaw tensed. A flash of resentment struck, but he forced himself to keep calm. He concentrated on keeping his hands loose and relaxed at his sides, rather than focusing on what he’d heard as presumption. 

“We’re….. I’m so sorry.”

Just like that, it was a step easier for Kylo to keep calm and continue listening. 

“We were wrong. We should have known that you would want to be your own person, and we should never have tried to take that away from you. And I… I needed to be more open-minded.”

Leia clasped her hands in front of her as Han spoke, holding them clamped tightly together. It was a trick she used when addressing the Senate, to keep her emotions in check. Right now, it barely worked. This conversation was a hundred times more challenging. She did her best to keep her voice even, as she spoke words she had gone over in her head a thousand times:

“We made the mistake of thinking you were just angry at us, when you said you wanted to take that first job. We hadn’t listened enough and we… we misunderstood.”

“I shouldn’t have tried to stop you that day,” Han admitted. His voice was low and heavy, and its sincerity made something unknot deep in Kylo’s chest. His parents had thought about why he’d left; They had finally begun to understand. At the least, they were trying. “I should have respected your decisions. And if we had taken more time, we would have known you weren’t just rebelling.”

Kylo pressed his lips together. He swallowed hard through a tumult threatening to burst from his chest. He hadn’t realized until now that he did ache for his parents’ approval and forgiveness. Even after all this time - It still mattered to him. 

In comparison, what importance did his old anger still play? What would it bring him? 

Since meeting Rey, he had gradually learned to control his emotions, rather than letting them control him. Since his youth, his anger and impatience had always been too quick to flare, often burning everything else away. But they were not the strongest part of him. They were not who he wanted to be. 

He wanted to be the man who would give his parents another chance. 

Kylo’s tongue was much slower to catch up. His mouth opened infinitesimally, but for a long moment words failed him. Before a few days ago, he couldn’t imagine even standing in his parents’ presence again. Now, suddenly here he was, ready to say he wanted to begin forgiving them. 

He looked at his father. His mouth supplied only a sheepish, “Your nose healed.”

After a surprised moment, Han let out a gruff chuckle. He touched his nose briefly. “It’s still crooked a tiny bit in the middle here. That’s some hook you have.” 

Kylo couldn’t look away from his father, not until he managed something more satisfactory.

“Sorry, too,” Kylo mumbled, struggling. “I am.”

“I deserved it.” Han offered the hint of a careful smile. “Son.”

This time, Kylo felt nothing inside him rear up against the word. He found himself, somehow, at peace with it.

Leia gave a sudden gasp beside them, exclaiming loudly, “You – you must be her!”

Attention swiveled to Rey, who straightened up and swiftly turned red. Her face had already gone a bit splotchy, listening to the exchange of apologies and watching Kylo’s internal exertion to extend reprieve to his parents. A moment ago, Rey had been almost overcome with how fiercely proud she was of him. Now, she was utterly unprepared for her moment in the spotlight.

Leia waved an appalled hand in the air, hastening towards Rey. “Oh, I’m sorry, you must forgive our terrible rudeness.”

“Of course,” Rey choked out. “Of course.”

Rey looked up, and Leia was there, looking at her with a kindhearted expression utterly foreign to Rey. She wasn’t sure what to do, what the appropriate thing was, so Rey acted automatically. 

“I’m Rey,” she said, sticking her hand out. “It’s really an honor to meet you.”

Leia looked from Rey’s hand to her face, then smiled gently. “The honor is mine, it really is. I’m so glad to meet you.” And without hesitating, the older woman pulled Rey into a firm embrace. 

Stunned, Rey stood motionless for a moment. And then, some deeply set instinct moved her – One she’d never had the chance to discover before. Her arms curled around Leia in return, and her chin came to rest against her shoulder. 

Over Leia’s shoulder, she found Kylo’s eyes. His brow was trembling as he watched them. For this moment alone, he loved his mother immeasurably. 

“I’m sorry,” Leia was mumbling as she pulled back, dabbing off-handedly at her eyes again. “I can’t wait to get to know you, Rey.”

Han came forward to place a hand on his wife’s shoulder. He looked at Rey with a fond, lopsided smile. 

He extended a hand, and when Rey extended hers in return he shook it energetically. 

“Welcome to the dysfunctional family,” he said simply. 

Leia clapped him on the chest reproachfully. “Getting better,” she said, looking in turn at her husband, Rey, then her son. “We’re getting better.”

 

“We’ll be along just behind you,” Rey assured, after Kylo had summoned someone to show his parents to the formal dining suite. “Won’t be a minute.”

The door sighed closed, and then Rey and Kylo were alone in the Reception Hall. 

His face was unreadable, so Rey went close to him. Waiting for him to speak, she reached out to link her fingers with his. His immediately wrapped around hers in return, squeezed. 

He was looking over her head, towards the door his parents had just passed through. It seemed surreal that they were here, on his ship. He had just spoken with them.

He pulled Rey a step closer by the hand. Breathing out in a slow exhale, his lips brushed across her forehead.

“Thank you,” he murmured.

She smoothed a tiny crease in his shirt.

“I didn’t do anything. You handled this all on your own.”

“Without you, I wouldn’t have had the strength for any of it.”

“Give yourself more credit.”

“Just… let me say it. Thank you.” 

“Alright.”

 

"I knew the First Order flagship would be impressive, but I must confess I'm still amazed," Leia said earnestly as the four of them sat down around the table after Kylo and Rey joined them. 

Han nodded, "This place is almost bigger than the Death Star."

Rey cut in smoothly when a glance at Kylo revealed his discomfort, "We have three hundred staff living here on the Supremacy. This is the central point for our operations in all star systems. All of our supply and revenue chains either start or end here, so we need sizable design and finance teams here managing both ends.

“All our other ships are much smaller. They're either production hubs or management centers for the systems where we do the heaviest business."

"It really is quite a business," Leia marveled aloud, not bothering to disguise the awe in her voice. Under the table, Kylo twisted his hands together. It wasn't anxiety making his chest feel all twisted up, but something more... pleasant, albeit foreign.

His mother went on, "You've made us renegotiate monopoly regulations in the Senate three times now. Everyone agrees your revenue volumes and sales reach practically qualify the First Order as an independent economy all to itself, but no one wants to be the one to actually try cutting back its influence. You have several loyal champions: One is never seen in anything but First Order signatures."

"Senator Rohila?” Rey asked, “I just processed her latest commission last week. Her orders do always take up a lot of Kylo’s time, so at least they win us a reliable ally.”

Plates were brought to the table and laid down before each of them. Wine was served. Leia was still considering the details – thinking back and listening between the lines. Her hands folded in front of her chin. She was clamoring for a better understanding of ‘we’ and ‘us.’

“So tell us how this happened.” 

Leia hadn’t stopped smiling at Kylo and Rey across the table since they sat down. Now, she barely touched her food. 

(Meanwhile, Han dug in with relish.

“This is great for canteen food.”

“Oh no, since I joined I made Kylo hire a proper team of chefs. We have a huge staff here we want to keep happy.”)

Rey looked at Kylo sideways, unable to stop herself from mirroring Leia’s mooning smile. 

“Well, we met on Jakku.”

“Jakku?” Han looked up in surprise. “Had to follow some junk trader there to get the Falcon back after he tried to jack her. How did this start on a dustbowl like Jakku?”

“Rey grew up on Jakku,” Kylo said dryly. 

Han looked appropriately chided and Leia stuck him with a glare, but Rey only laughed. “It’s perfectly fine. Jakku really is a dustbowl and I have no attachment to it anymore.”

“Three years ago, Jakku was up and coming in a new sector of the industry,” Kylo explained, gloved hands spreading in the air above his untouched plate. “Not many designer brands had set up a presence there yet, but those that did were making a foothold in the whole star system. So, I had to exhibit there.”

“I happened to be the director of the exhibition where he showcased. Let me tell you, he was a challenge, made that event such a pain.” Rey shook her head in jest, even while looking at Kylo fondly. 

“So she bossed me around a bit, and pulled off the exhibition flawlessly. I was so impressed, I asked if she would accept a job as my personal assistant.”

“I had to think twice before I accepted. He was already one of the biggest figures in the industry even back then, but also rumored to be one of the most difficult to work with. He never compromises and is rarely known to be humble.”

Kylo just shrugged indifferently when eyes turned towards him, expecting an objection that didn’t come.

Rey finished, “But every day since then, I’ve been so glad I did.”

She laid her hand on the table beside his, leaving the line of appearances up to him. He immediately responded to cover it with his own, oblivious to any reason why he wouldn’t.

“It wasn’t a problem – working together?” Leia asked, her eyes lifting from Rey and Kylo’s hands with a bright glimmer.

Rey shook her head right away. “I’m more his boss than he mine.” 

Kylo gave a slight nod, lips touched by a rueful smile. “It’s true.” 

“He tolerates that I order him around because he knows I’m the more level-headed of the two of us. And I don’t mind that he can be difficult because I enjoy the challenge.”

As if the link between their hands connected their very thoughts, they followed on to each other seamlessly.

“This was all already built before Rey joined me,” Kylo added, sweeping his arm out in a vague gesture to indicate the massive headquarter ship in whose upper-most deck they were currently dining. “Although the First Order had the revenues already, it was all… empty. She brought heart and soul to the company.”

“To back up his vision.”

“But I never truly found my vision before her.”

“He asked me to marry him about a month ago. This time, I didn’t have to think twice.”

Leia looked completely satisfied. Really, she looked overjoyed. Something very rare was happening to her: Senator Organa was at a loss for words.

Smiling unconsciously himself, it took Han a long moment to realize his wife had nothing to say.

“So, when’s the big day?”

Rey beamed so wide she might have risked combustion. 

“Three weeks from today. We only decided last week where to have it. It might be a bit cliché but… we reserved a private resort on Naboo. We’ll have the ceremony there, then stay the rest of the month. We really wanted somewhere remote, where press can’t follow us. We normally get so little time alone, it was important that it just be us, away from the world for a little while.”

Rey’s gaze trailed from Kylo to the older couple sitting across from them. For the first time, she grew a touch bashful. 

“Just us and family.”

Leia smiled, strong and touched. 

“We would be honored to be there for you – For both of you.”

She locked eyes with Rey for a moment. Some warm understanding passed between them, and Rey had to make an immense effort to swallow and push back tears. 

“Even if you had the wedding on Hoth, we’d be there.”

Han pretended to scoff. “I don’t know about that. I’ve got more than enough memories of that frigid place for one lifetime.”

But while Leia focused on Rey, Han’s gaze reached for Kylo. He and his son had both exchanged apologies for those years of misunderstandings and mistreatment, on Han’s part. Han knew it would still take a long time, a long effort, before he and the not-so-young man before him felt truly at ease around each other. 

But this moment across a shared meal, discussing his son’s happiness – It felt like a better start than Han could ever have imagined. Han forced himself to hold his son’s gaze, until he was sure Ben knew wordlessly that of course, Han would have done whatever it took to find their next steps together. 

Kylo gave Rey’s fingers an imperceptible squeeze, as he looked back at his father.

 

“We’ll send you both all the details, as soon as they’re set.”

The four of them were standing beside the speeder Han and Leia had arrived in. Kylo had been the one to offer seeing them off, even while Rey did most of the talking for them both.

“And we’ll have plenty of room. If you’d like, you could spend a few days there with us on Naboo, after the ceremony.”

Where Kylo and Rey stopped and stood together, they gravitated naturally towards each other. Rey’s shoulder tucked in beneath Kylo’s arm, his hand resting at her waist. Han and Leia both looked to their son, to confirm Rey’s offer.

He nodded stiffly. “Yes, you could. If you both want to.”

Leia seemed to all but glow, as she darted a look up towards her husband. 

“Just tell us when, and we’ll be there.”

Han nodded, his expression set but a twinkle behind it. “We’ll look for your message.”

Kylo nodded, squeezing his mouth against the inane urge to smile more than his face was built for. 

“I’ll see that your refueling completed,” he said hurriedly, going off to speak in low tones with the tech crew who’d been assigned to the ship. They all straightened to attention at his approach, nodding vigorously and responding firmly to Kylo’s inquiries. 

In the silent moment he left behind him, Leia looked at Rey with soft eyes. Rey returned her gaze, smiling easily. Rey’s nerves in the older woman’s presence had evaporated, but she still couldn’t say she understood what existed here, or had any idea what to expect. 

Before Rey had a chance to start puzzling it out, Leia stepped forward and embraced her for the second time that day. 

Leia Organa was a very perceptive woman. It was what made her so good at politics. But today, it had served a very different function. Today, even while conversation had barely turned to Rey’s own story, Leia thought she sensed its major chapters. 

“Thank you, Rey,” Leia murmured, when Rey laid her head against Leia’s shoulder. Rey wasn’t sure why everyone seemed to be thanking her today, when she felt like she’d done the least out of all of them. Even still, Rey couldn’t bring herself to speak and spoil the moment. She simply stood still and listened, letting the gentle words and embrace soak in.

“Thank you for making sure he’s never alone. And thank you for helping him come back to us.”

Rey’s eyes were wet when Kylo returned. He looked at her for a moment in concern, until her wobbly smile calmed him. 

Leia came close. Close enough that she had to tilt her head back to look into her son’s face.

“Thank you for today. I… I can’t tell you how much it means to us, Be-…” Leia cut herself off sharply, only just in time. One mistake earlier had been honest, unprepared instinct. Two mistakes felt like willful disregard. 

She cleared her throat.

“Kylo.”

“Mother,” he said immediately, looking at her with his lips parted and expression open. “It’s alright.”

Leia’s face wavered just at the edge of composure. She opened her mouth, but at first no sound came out. In the place of words, her hands reached to briefly grasp Kylo’s arms, just below the elbows. 

“Ben,” she said, soft and wondrous. 

Once Leia pulled herself back, Han slowly stepped forward. He’d never been one to maneuver well with words. Instead, he stiffened his mouth and extended an open hand, bold and deliberate. 

Kylo looked from the hand to his father’s lined face, his gaze darting between them repeatedly. 

Finally, he matched Han’s hand with his own. 

Leia gave an audible sigh of relief from behind them. Giving his son’s hand a single small shake, Han’s face betrayed a valiant effort to keep fixed. He said simply, “We’ll see you both on Naboo. I’ll be sure to wear something nice.”

One side of Kylo’s mouth quirked. “See that you do, though I’ll be the judge of that.”

Rey returned to his side as the door to the speeder lowered open. She bit her lip as she watched Han and Leia begin to turn towards the ship. Then it sputtered out before she could stop herself.

“Han!”

He stopped before stepping onto the walkway, turned back. 

“I should really like to see the Millennium Falcon some time.”

Over Han’s shoulder, Leia chuckled to herself. Meanwhile, Han couldn’t contain the grin this time.

“And I should love to show you some time. I’ll have to warn you though, she doesn’t fly much anymore and she’s gone a bit rusty.”

“That’s okay. I’m sure it adds to her charm.”

“That’s just what I always say.”

Still smiling to himself, Han met Kylo’s eyes once more and gave a nod, slight but ripe with approval. Behind him, Leia smacked his arm.

“Oh, come on, already.”

“Coming, dear.”

Rey heard Kylo laugh to himself under his breath, as they watched Leia and Han disappear into the small ship and the door lift and seal. 

When she finally looked up to his face beside her, she found a far-off look of peace. 

 

“It was strange. Seeing their faces.”

“How so?”

“They were much changed, yet I would have recognized them anywhere. It made the memories come up sharper than I expected, but the anger didn’t come with them.”

“It seemed like they want to make those memories right. But more importantly, they want to know you now – Who you’ve become on your own.” 

“New memories. With no misunderstandings this time.”

“I hope I didn’t overstep, inviting them to stay after the wedding…”

“No. No, it was just fine. We’ll have more than enough room for them. And it will be more worth their trip, that way.”

“You know… I’ve been there next to you, watching you accept more awards than I could count. Watching you get standing ovations and press adulations. But… the love with which they looked at you today, and how you found the forgiveness and strength to accept it... I’ve never been prouder to be yours.”

“….. I’ve never been proud of anything like I am that you’re mine.”

 

The lights were dimmed in their bedroom. The blankets were askew and damp. The ship was silent around them. 

Rey’s chest still heaved slightly beneath Kylo’s arms, wrapped around her from behind. The only soft sound came from Kylo’s lips tracing a lingering path across Rey’s bare shoulder. Rey stretched her head back in the pillows, letting out a languid sigh as Kylo’s mouth wandered and idled along her neck. Against her breasts, her fingers threaded together with his. 

“After the wedding, after your parents leave, I can’t wait to just spend days in bed,” Rey whispered, settling back even more tightly against his bare body. “But then again, with no one else around… We’re not limited to the bed, or even the bedroom. You can make love to me on the kitchen table, on the terrace, by that lake that looked so beautiful in the pictures…”

Kylo sounded a soft groan of approval while he mouthed a spot behind Rey’s ear where he knew she was sensitive. To his pleasure, he felt her shiver against him. He brushed a thumb over one of her nipples. They had only peaked some ten minutes ago, but all this talk of lovemaking made his fingers yearn to trail down between her legs and stroke her to wetness again. 

Rey shifted in his arms, moving to face him until she could cup his face between her hands and kiss him slowly. Kylo went boneless, forgetting all his thoughts and plans to Rey’s questing tongue – Brushing so tenderly and tasting so sweet.

“Three weeks is too long,” Rey murmured, so wonderfully close Kylo could feel the words against his own mouth. “I can’t wait to be your wife.”

Kylo hummed and Rey felt her lips buzz. He nuzzled her cheek, mouthing a kiss to the corner of her mouth.

“Will you still order me around then?”

“Mm. Count on it.”

Wife. She would be his wife. Sometimes, Kylo was too preoccupied trying to process the marvel that was this woman’s existence in the universe – much less her presence in his own life; that big concepts like this slid over him without full comprehension. They were simply too big, too incredible. It would probably take a good year of married life before the full reality dawned on him that Rey would belong to him and only him for the rest of their lives. And just the same, he would belong to her. 

She wanted him to belong to her – for the rest of their lives. 

“I guess it’s for the best,” Rey murmured with a dramatic sigh. “We do need these three weeks to tie up everything here before we go and disappear for a whole month.”

Rey dipped a hand across Kylo’s chest, her fingers brushing his skin. 

“Not to mention, I’m sure you’re going to take every bit of those three weeks to finish whatever ridiculously elaborate or expensive dress you have planned.”

Kylo’s hand had been skimming its way down Rey’s side. It had just started rubbing her hip when suddenly it froze. 

Then the rest of him froze. Slowly, then suddenly all at once. 

“Wedding dress” he gasped, dry and stunned.

Rey pulled back just enough to open her eyes all the way and look at him in concern. Kylo’s eyes were wide, fixed at some random point on the wall behind her. 

“I didn’t even think…”

He laid there stunned and frozen for a moment longer. Then, he was suddenly scrambling against the blankets, throwing them in all directions in a crazed haste to get up. 

Startled, Rey sat up. She watched him leap to where he’d dropped his clothes and frantically start pulling them back on.

“I’ll just be down the hall. In the studio. You don’t have to wait up, I’ll probably be all night.”

“Kylo, you really don’t have to…”

“I do. Oh, I do,” he said ardently. “I simply cannot believe I didn’t remember until now. Your dress, your dress…”

Rey looked apprehensive that her fiancé might be going slightly insane. Once he was dressed, he paused his mad scramble from the room to lean down at the bedside and press a quick kiss to the top of Rey’s head.

“Don’t worry. Three weeks is still more than I’ll need to make it perfect.”

Rey reached out and caught him by the hand, stilling him for half a second.

“It’s already going to be perfect. New dress or no.”

“We only get married once, so we need an unparalleled piece for this unparalleled occasion. Besides, you know how much I love seeing you in my designs.”

Rey sighed, despite the automatic smile already growing on her face. She squeezed his hand.

“Fine. But promise me you won’t stress over it too much.”

“Stress? No other project will ever bring me this much joy.”

It was the grin – the rare, full grin – stretching his lips that finally made Rey release his hand. She started pulling the blankets back into place from where he’d scattered them. 

“No all-nighter, alright? Promise I won’t wake up alone in the morning?”

“Promise.”

He leaned down to kiss her once more before dashing from the room and off towards his studio. Rey curled herself up in the blankets with a fond smile of amusement and a loving shake of her head. 

 

Rey was beginning to think Kylo was one of the few men in the whole galaxy who didn't enjoy receiving oral sex. Between fighting fiercely to keep his hips still from bucking forward and warning Rey when he strayed anywhere near the edge, he never seemed to relax much into it.

But he'd had a more trying day than usual, and when Rey hadn't seen any sign of the stressed shadows fading from his face, she'd wanted to.

Kylo had never before shut down First Order operations in their entirety. It was proving a more trying task than either of them had expected. Docking the Supremacy and grounding the fleet of operations ships scattered across the dozens of star systems where the First Order did business turned out to be a veritable logistical nightmare. 

Today's meeting with Intergalactic customs agents about securing landing permits had sucked away half the day, and still left Rey with a list of half a dozen other local authorities whose authorization would have to be secured.

Then there were all the calls with the merchants and vendors in their sales chains. Yes, all deliveries would be suspended for the following month; Yes, all of them; Yes, please keep shelf and storage allotments open; Yes, we'll compensate the commission payments you'd normally make; Yes, all normal shipments will resume afterwards; No, we're not cutting down operations size; Yes, Supreme Designer Ren is still pleased with your sector's sales performance.

Rey went on repetition autopilot and tried to knock out all the calls she could. But a small number of sales reps had never worked with her before and weren't convinced by the unusual call. A few times, she'd had to find Kylo and hand him the communicator with an apologetic expression.

By the third time, he sighed and snapped down the line, "For your future reference, Rey operates with my full and equal authority. If you ever question her again, we'll no longer be doing business."

"Sorry. Thank you," Rey hurried to say. Kylo waved her off, just gently enough to know it wasn't her he was frustrated with. Never her.

By the end of the day, Kylo looked gaunt and overwhelmed. Planning the pause in operations had ironically doubled the usual workload. Late in the evening, he'd stumbled into their living quarters and all but collapsed into one of the kitchen chairs. 

"I've been waiting all day to work on the dress," he murmured, bleary.

Rey rubbed his shoulder. "Not tonight." 

Kylo was visibly torn between his body's physical exhaustion and his mental preoccupation with visions of Rey's perfect wedding dress. He wanted to rise from the chair again, but his limbs seemed too heavy. 

"Not tonight," Rey repeated, gently. "Stay."

She nudged his knees apart to make enough room for her to slide down between them. While one hand stroked the inside of his knee, her other undid his pants enough so her mouth could find him. 

Listening to his breathing escalate deeper, then higher; feeling his trembling fingers so gentle in her hair – She was determined to make him enjoy it this time. 

Then, he’d have no place to go but straight to bed with her. 

 

"Would you approve if the dress weren't entirely traditional white?"

"When have you ever asked for my input? Even when the designs were for me, you always insist you know best."

It was early, before the day’s first meetings. Kylo was nursing his second caf while Rey packed her bag on the kitchen table.

"This is different. I want to make something original, but it's most important that you're happy wearing it. I want it to be everything you could have wanted."

"If you made it, and I'm wearing it to marry you, it will be the best thing I've ever put on.” 

Most of Rey’s focus had been diverted towards organizing the day’s files, but now she tucked the final folders into her bag and looked up towards Kylo.

“Besides, I trust you. Even when your designs sound ridiculous in concept, every one I've ever worn has been beautiful."

Kylo was suddenly struck with a highly distressing thought. His face pulled taut, he set his caf down and came to put his arms around her. He bent down to rest his head against hers before asking quietly, "You're not just saying that to make me happy, are you? I know you don't really care for trends or haute couture."

Rey rolled her eyes where he couldn't see, even as she smiled into his shoulder. "You're exactly right that I don't care - Certainly not enough to lie about liking something I don't really. You just know my taste. I can't say I would want to wear everything you make, but everything you make for me - just for me - is perfect. Really." 

Her arms around his torso, she gave him a reassuring squeeze while breathing in the familiar comfort of him. 

“I know how important these things are to you. I would never lie to you about my opinion, and I would never wear something unless I truly love it.”

Kylo pulled back enough so he could see her face. He raised one hand to brush some of Rey’s hair back from her face.

“So you’re sure about a dress that’s not entirely white?”

“We’re already completely breaking tradition, with you designing the dress and knowing exactly what it looks like, while I probably won’t see it until the day I put it on.”

“But I won’t see you in the dress until the wedding day. And that’s the part that matters. Without you, it’s just a pile of fabric.”

Rey raised an eyebrow, touched. “I can’t believe you just called your most exciting project ‘a pile of fabric’. Besides, when has anything about us – or you – ever been traditional or monochromatic?” Smiling, Rey tipped up onto her toes to reach a kiss to his lips. “Sounds just the way I like it.”

 

Five days until the wedding, and they were both busier than ever. Final shutdown procedures were being implemented – some figured out on the fly – before staff began leaving for their month of paid leave. 

Kylo passed Rey in one of the Supremacy’s main corridors at the end of the day, on his way to his larger studio – she hurrying towards their living quarters.

“I forgot about packing our things for Naboo!” she said frantically.

They had planned to leave two days from now, giving them three days to settle in and for Kylo’s parents to arrive before the ceremony.

“Should I help?” Kylo asked, at a loss. 

“No, no, I’ll manage,” Rey called over her shoulder, waving vaguely as she barreled off around the corner.

Two days. It echoed in Kylo’s head as he stood in the middle of his studio, an index finger resting over his lips as he studied the gown hung from a mannequin before him. Two days to perfect the most important piece he would ever make.

His own complimenting tux was already finished, pressed, and ready to be transported. But Rey’s dress… 

At the least, he recognized that he would never be completely satisfied with it. He would never declare it complete or perfect. He wanted it to be everything Rey could want – the perfect dress, perfectly suited to her – but he knew nothing could ever be quite good enough.

Kylo went around to add some extra stitching at the back, adjusting the fall of the fabric slightly. He knew Rey’s measurements to the millimeter, and was sure the bodice would fit her just right. But he wouldn’t see her in it until the wedding day, nor would she see the dress. 

So Kylo could only do his best to imagine how much the train would flutter when she walked; How thick to make the silk of the skirt so it rippled out from her waist just correctly; How many water droplet diamonds to use before they sparkled too much. 

Kylo stepped back to examine again. It had been an exceptionally long and busy day, but Kylo envisioned with perfect clarity the swirl of the hem around Rey’s ankles, the taper of the bodice to her waistline. 

It had been an exceptionally long day, but Kylo found himself filled with nothing but pure serenity.

~

“Beautiful… I didn’t know there was this much green in the whole galaxy.”

The low-altitude shuttle skimmed across pure blue lake water, sending out a frothy wake as they approached the stone and clay walls and terraces of the secluded resort. Sunlight sparkled from the wide windows, beckoning them through the soft verdant green of trees along the lakeside. Rey marveled aloud. A short time ago, she couldn’t even have imagined the existence of such places.

She had been the one to immediately think of Naboo for the wedding. She’d visited a few times before, but only the major cities for gala events with Kylo. But even the natural beauty of the cities had enraptured her, and she’d dreamed of one day seeing the ripe green meadows and azure lakes, whose mere existence eased the haunt of Jakku’s dry sands and parched flats. 

Rey had brought Kylo pictures of modest villas they could rent in popular nature conservancy destinations. He’d been silent for a moment, flicking through. Then he’d sat back and looked at her.

“We can do much better. You’re sure Naboo?” he asked, voice impartial as he stood and retrieved his data pad.

“Yes, think so.” Puzzled, Rey watched his gloved fingers work the screen for a minute. 

Then he made a few calls. Rey recognized some names of collaborators and organizers Kylo had worked with for shows on Naboo. She didn’t hear the full conversations, but by the end of the day, he had paid in full to entirely rent out the planet’s most exclusive and secretive resort villa, tucked away in such a remote corner of Lake Country, even the few who’d heard of it weren’t sure of its exact location. While Rey tended to last-minute First Order shutdown protocols, Kylo had arranged everything for their getaway. 

A few hours ago, they had landed Kylo’s speeder in Theed, where a veteran guide had met them with a shuttle ready. As the guide flew them through landscapes of pure green without a town or even a road in sight, Rey had momentarily feared that they would never see civilization again.

Then, finally he’d announced their arrival. She and Kylo had come out to the shuttle’s front deck to watch the villa come into view – An elegant, age-old extension of the trees and clay shores it stood cradled in.

Words failed Rey as the shuttle stilled before the tiered terraces and balconies of the villa. She itched with the urge to throw her arms around Kylo for finding them something so otherworldly exquisite, but she saw him smiling only slightly, while he resisted letting his gaze fully focus on her. She sensed it was the guide’s presence, so she contended herself – for now – with squeezing his hand before she went to retrieve her bag. 

Kylo thanked and tipped the guide, who would bring Han and Leia upon their arrival on planet the next day. The guide had explained during the trip that they should have everything they needed at the resort, thanks to the droid staff who harvested and prepared meals, kept the villa spotless, and the linens perpetually fresh.

They watched the shuttle fade off across the water. Rey waved, excitement bubbling up within her to tear off and explore every inch of the veritable palace that would be theirs for the next month. 

Kylo’s voice reeled her back. “I know that technically, we aren’t married yet… But we’re only a few days away and I do want to observe this particular tradition…”

With no further warning, Kylo bent and swept Rey up off the ground. Startled, she let out a brief shriek before her hands found Kylo’s shoulders. She quickly melted into laughter and his strong arms beneath her back and legs.

“But the bags!”

“We’re the only ones around for miles and the droids will bring them in.” Kylo was already across the terrace, halfway to the wide veranda doors that were flung open in welcome for them. Rey was utterly incapable of protest. 

Kylo slowed slightly in the doorway, careful to hold Rey close so neither her head nor feet caught the frame. She wrapped her arms more securely around his neck and savored the warmth of him against her, as he carried her through the doorway of what would be their first temporary abode as a wedded couple. Rey felt so deliriously lost in the rapture of the moment, it took several rooms before she could look anywhere but up into Kylo’s face. 

The villa had seven bedrooms. Not that Rey had any hope of remembering such an unimportant detail, when Kylo discovered the first. The wide, canopied bed stood in the center of the round room, ablaze with sunlight from the open terrace doors. The creamy white of the sheets danced in hues of orange and blue – mixed from the setting sun and the reflected sunlight from the lake. 

Kylo laid his soon-to-be wife in the bed of shimmering lights and she pulled him into the depths with her. Shoes dropped over the side. Clothes stripped and pushed impatiently aside landed in all directions.

Embracing him close against her heat with open thighs, Rey kissed each of Kylo’s lips in urgent reverence. She twirled her fingers in his beloved hair and sang his name as he kissed each of her breasts. 

Both wanting nothing in the world but to sink together to their very cores, Kylo stretched his arms above Rey’s head on the bed, feeling her breath of fulfillment against his own mouth and the arched rise of her body against his own. Through the tight embrace of supple pleasure that was the welcome of Rey’s body, he breathed deep to keep himself relaxed, slow, savoring. As Rey’s hands and knees slid higher and higher up his back, it was not only mind-burning pleasure that he sought. 

With each sigh of joy from her lips, Kylo mapped his way to her deepest self – Each long, gentle thrust within her uncovering the path only he knew. Kissing her brow, her nose, he savored the moans and curses and words of love she released for him. He tasted her orgasm on her tongue before he felt her tighten, shuddering and squeezing around him hard enough to make him fall from everything he knew. 

Free-falling together, they kissed air back into each other’s lungs. They clung to each other not just to chase each last drop of pleasure, but to remain within each other’s essence for as long as they possibly could.

“You are the most beautiful thing I will ever know in this world,” Kylo murmured, lips caressing at her collarbone. He had withdrawn from her, but the world of intangible grace and magnificence she housed him in had yet to fade. 

Rey tilted her face down against his hair, cradling his head so she could close her eyes and breathe him in. Her mind was still struggling to piece itself back together – Not yet able to produce speech. She stroked his hair until clarity slowly returned. 

“You’re what makes me feel beautiful. You make me feel like I could be the whole universe.”

Kylo unwound himself from her only enough so he could look up into her eyes – reach his fingertips to her cheek.

“You already are my whole universe.”

And just like that, after a moment of looking into his eyes and letting his words settle into her heart – She needed to be one with him again. 

Her hands frantic but gentle, she rolled him down and herself on top, straddling herself over his hips. His face looked caught off guard, until she leaned down to kiss him. Then she rolled her hips over his, until he could feel where she was wet again. His moan was torn between lingering sensitivity and his unremitting desire for her. 

Coaxing him to meet her, Rey sat back for a moment. Bracing herself with her hands on his thighs, she rocked herself against his navel. In hardly no time at all, his groans grew deeper and she felt him rising hard again. Eager, she helped him the rest of the way. Feeling him swell between her thighs, she canted her hips until she could find him precisely, letting the head of his cock slide against her hot clit and nestle in her folds – letting her wetness drip over him until he was flushed and primed for her again. 

Panting, he held her hip with one hand and the base of his cock with the other. Thankful, Rey spread her thighs wide on either side of him and immediately worked herself down around his thick head. Watching himself slowly disappear within her and hearing the mewl of his name from her mouth as she sank down further, Kylo grit his teeth and swore in the effort to keep still.

He always felt so much bigger this way, and Rey adored each delicious inch. She loved the way she had to work her own body open on his girth. Sinking down further, Rey’s back arched and her head fell back. Kylo forced his eyes open to marvel at her. 

She finally seated herself on him fully with a hitched gasp. Kylo watched her throat work as she moaned, a rosy blush rising along her skin. When she bobbed slightly to embed him in her very core, her breasts heaved and Kylo could see her nipples going hard and bright. The hand not at her waist flew to gather one of her breasts, his fingers taking impatient turns to circle and rub her tight nipples. 

Panting above him now and needing flow, Rey propped her knees under her to hold her weight. She slid into a quick rhythm, chasing the sparks of fire that blazed within her each time she lifted and sunk down onto him again. Wanting to always keep him as deep as she could, she only rose higher if it meant she could drop down harder, crying out when she felt herself consumed more deeply. 

Kylo’s hand grew more desperate at her chest, his breathing ragged. His other hand slid abruptly to her lower back for leverage as he surged up into a sitting position. Rey moaned out as the shift in positions made his head bump her most sensitive place inside, her fingers tangling ruthlessly in his hair as his lips and teeth claimed one of her breasts. 

Hooking her arm around his shoulders for purchase, Rey shifted to a rocking rhythm. She swayed her hips in delicious, dragging circles, all the while keeping him as deep inside her as she could. Her fingers in his hair and nipple wet between his lips, Rey closed her eyes and gave herself over to the burning inside her. 

With each shift of her hips, she came a little more undone. The more the pleasure mounted, the more sensitive she became. Stirring her hips in circles, she savored each unique spark of heat. By the time her peak approached, she was crying out each time she leaned forward into him, her hips still stuttering forward to wring herself around him, even as he seemed to be swelling impossibly larger within her. Impossible that she could hold all of him within her small frame. And still, she wanted all of him. Still, she wanted more. At the edge of her wits, Rey rocked into him in a final frenzy, sparks bursting behind her vision as Kylo’s searing thickness filled every inch of her senses, and finally made something burst apart at her core. 

Rey was aware of only darkness for a few drifting, directionless seconds. Gradually, the rush of her release ebbed away, her nerves tingling with lingering electricity. 

Slowly, she became aware that she was lying on her back, meaning Kylo must have laid her on the bed. The fury of heat that had consumed her a moment ago ebbed away from her like the tide of the sea, but she still felt soothing, drifting bits of warm waves stroking her like feathers. Gradually, her mind understood the sensation. 

She realized her legs were spread wide, with Kylo’s head between them. He was cleaning her release from her, his tongue stroking her in long caresses. He was slow and careful, making sure he didn’t over stimulate her. But this had become one of his favorite habits, and he knew her limits. 

Rey knew he loved the taste of their mingled release, leaking from inside of her. She knew he loved to kiss her there, when she was hot and wet and sensitive from his lovemaking. And she, too, had come to love the filthy intimacy of it – Feeling the tenderness of his lips against the place where his cock had devastated her. Rey closed her eyes, every inch of her floating and glowing. She let her legs fall open wider and whispered Kylo’s name.

 

“We’ll have to explore one of the other rooms for round three.”

“Three?” Kylo chuckled from deep in his chest, his body winded but heart and soul both humming, more alive than ever. “I might not survive this month.”

A faint tapping and rustling came from the direction of the doorway Kylo had carried Rey through, but deep adrift as they were in each other, neither fully noticed.

Until a high-pitched, automated voice spoke, “Dear Madam and Sir.”

Rey jolted with a surprised yelp, while Kylo instinctively pushed himself in front of her to hide her nakedness behind his broad frame. 

“I’m terribly sorry if I intruded, but I would be remiss to let another minute go by without welcoming you both!”

Rey’s alarm extinguished and she let her head fall back to the bed, laughing. Kylo just stared in disbelief at the hospitality droid that kept standing there, blinking and chirping and apparently lacking any shred of discretion programming.

“Right. Thank you…”

“It is a great, great honor to host Supreme Designer Ren and his bride.” The droid’s head swiveled towards Rey, seeming utterly oblivious to her state of undress. “Oh, but do pardon me, Mistress Rey, I was so excited for both of your arrivals, I read quite a bit about you too and you are most remarkable. Most remarkable indeed – Jakku of all places!”

If it were physically possible for a droid to shudder in distaste, the gleaming gold droid vibrated in the closest thing to it.

“That’s kind of you,” Rey said, laughter still hovering around her. She tapped Kylo’s shoulder so he moved off her enough for her to sit up. Bemused, she watched the droid not even bat an illuminated eye bulb at her naked chest. “What should we call you?”

The buttons and displays along his chest lighting up in delight, the droid puffed up and responded, “CT1! Short designation for Caretaker 1, since I am the foremost of the five droid staff who will be attending you both during your stay. I am unquestionably the most attentive in taking care of our valued guests!”

Rey had to hover her hand over her mouth to hide the trace of mirth.

“I don’t doubt it. Thank you for your welcome, CT1. If you wouldn’t mind, we left our bags downstairs…”

“Already tended to!” C1 piped proudly. “They’ve been brought to the largest bedroom of the house. Up on the third floor, it offers an unparalleled view over the lake and meadows. Would you like me to show you both the way?”

“Er… that’s alright. We’ll find our way up there shortly.”

“Very good, Master Ren, very good. If you both have any appetite, we’ve prepared a light luncheon in the ground floor sunroom. I’ll go ensure everything’s being kept warm.”

The droid bowed back and forth at the middle as he backed from the room. “Wonderful to meet you both. Such an honor to have you here, such an honor…”

Rey contained her bubble of laughter from bursting until C1 backed completely out of sight and earshot.

“Unbelievable. Not a shred of common decency programming,” Kylo groused, shaking his head.

“Oh, it might not be so bad,” Rey countered, still giggling softly. “He might have been programmed that way on purpose. Think – tons of honeymoon couples probably stay here. If he had discretion programming, he’d probably be so busy worrying about propriety and what he might be walking into every time he turns a corner, he could never do his job. And if the droids are oblivious… It’s like we’re still alone.” 

She leaned in close to peck the corner of Kylo’s disgruntled frown. Then she laid a light trail of kisses to his left ear, where she breathed warmth and gently nibbled until he softened into her and his annoyance melted away. 

“We can still make love wherever we want,” she whispered in a tempting promise. “You can still have me on the kitchen table, on every one of the terraces, at the lakeside…”

“Hmm… You make a convincing argument. Perhaps it is a blessing in disguise.”

“Mm, I would say so.”

Rey lifted a hand to his cheek to tilt his face towards her, so she could come close and kiss the lush pair of lips she loved so. They were unparalleled, really – The strongest intoxicant in the galaxy.

“Let’s go find our bedroom,” she murmured, thinking she’d be happy to let him carry her there as well – To hell with the over enthused droids. 

 

“You’re going to spoil the pleats.” 

It was such an incredibly _Kylo_ thing to say, but it was his tone rather than the words themselves that made Rey drop the fabric of her dress where it had been bunched in her hands. Instead of wondering whether she looked a fool in the elegant red dress that could have been made for a courtly lady of royalty, she turned a look of adoration towards him at her side and couldn’t even bring herself to tease him.

_“You’re putting wrinkles in the fabric.” “Sweat any more and the crepe paper mache will dissolve.” “Stand up straight or the figure shape will be ruined.”_

Starting with that very first day together, backstage on Jakku, Rey had become accustomed to his perfection-seeking, clipped orders and scoldings – Shaping aesthetic perfection with a vision that soared parsecs above the individual people whose bodies and figures were his willing canvasses. 

When she first joined him, she’d thought there must be a price for his brusqueness. Surely there would come a time when no models would work for him anymore. But no reckoning ever came. Even the few he’d once made cry because they’d claimed to be smaller sizes than they were and the bespoke designs he’d tailored to their purported measurements didn’t fit on exhibition day – They called up Rey to make sure they were in the program for next year. This time, they gave honest measurements. Rey remembered her own bemused eye roll when Kylo checked the fit before the following exhibition, and his nod of approval sent them all into giggling fits. 

But when he murmured to her about stupid pleats – here on the reception terrace overlooking the lake as they awaited his parents’ arrival – his voice was only lilting tease and rich honey. His voice was always deep, but in his most gentle moments (only ever with Rey), it was a rumbling, warm darkness filled with stars, that wrapped and lifted her. The quiet tone held more meaning and feeling than his most important public addresses. 

On the day they met, she would never have believed all that soft gravity in his voice would be meant not for his designs, but for something – one incredibly fortunate someone – that infused a divine purpose to all he created; A mirror of all he was. 

It was an endearment for her – The splendid pleated dress only an incidental. The wedding dress was hidden away in a deep corner of their bedroom closet – The most elaborate endearment of all.

“Don’t make me something with pleats ever again.”

Her fingers found his wrist. Her fingertips felt his heart beating and she saw his slight, soaring smile. The words themselves couldn’t have mattered less. 

“Duly noted.”

“…. Maybe we shouldn’t be making out when your parents arrive.”

“To the contrary, I think Father would get a kick out of it. There’s still something of the scoundrel in there.”

Both abruptly turned at the sound of a motor in the distance. At first they could only see the guide standing at the front of the shuttle, but a moment later two more figures appeared from beneath the covered back of the vehicle.

Rey felt Kylo straighten at her side. She slid her fingers between his, glad to feel his warm skin rather than gloves. His fingers closed around hers in their natural fit of symmetry.

He’d brought none of his stiff, formal clothes to Naboo. Rey hadn’t packed any of his cloaks or cowls or thick doublets, and when she’d asked him to check over his bag he hadn’t added any. Today, he wore only open-necked short sleeves with dark trousers. Between the planet’s warm air and Rey’s loving glances, he found he didn’t feel naked at all. 

He couldn’t remember the last time he’d dressed so casually – accustomed as he was to always feeling on the defensive, always on performance before spotlights and critics and staff and publics. But he was finally realizing he shouldn’t have to live his life in a constant state of costume. Rey made him forget even the idea of being anyone else but himself. Anyone else wouldn’t have Rey. 

And didn’t his parents deserve to know him as he was – Rather than the public mask he wore for the galaxy’s consumption?

Rey waved when Han and Leia’s faces came into view, more excited than she expected. She still remembered what Leia’s embrace had felt like – The unconditional approval and appreciation Rey hadn’t even realized she missed. And although Kylo had suffered through his misunderstandings with Han, she believed the man had an earnest wish to make things right. Even when he couldn’t express it, Rey believed he loved his son just as he was. 

“Rey, you look marvelous. So wonderful to see you!” Smiling wide, Leia immediately opened her arms in Rey’s direction when she stepped off the shuttle, Rey already moving forward into them. 

“I’m so glad you both came! Welcome.” Rey stepped back from the embrace only to pointedly smooth her elaborate dress. “Kylo’s design, of course. He fills my closet with these ridiculous things even if I don’t want them.”

“Hey, that is an Exclusive that would easily price at 5,000 units if it ever went on the market.” 

Kylo moved forward and leaned down to embrace his mother as well. “Thank you for coming all the way here.” 

As he straightened again – full heads taller than her – Leia reached up to pat his cheek with a misty smile. “We wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

Behind his wife, Han finally came up from the shuttle with bags in hand. He let them drop with a theatrical “oof,” then smiled at Rey as she came to greet him. 

“I’d tell you not to work Ben as hard as Leia works me, but I think you’re both too rich for that.”

“Oh no, doesn’t matter how rich he is - I still work him.” 

Han gave an approving chuckle, and when Rey saw how his aged face crinkled in kind laughter lines, she bypassed the formal handshake to give him a quick hug as well. 

He gave her dress an impressed look when she pulled back. 

“Well, we’re underdressed. I brought a suit of course for the ceremony tomorrow but…”

“It’s a hazard of marrying him. I’m going to be perpetually overdressed wherever I go. But all things considered, I think I can bear it.”

Coming to greet his father with a short smile that was still a touch strained but not at all disingenuous, Kylo interposed, “Actually, we’ll all be appropriately dressed. I prepared formal wear for both of you for tomorrow. I had to do some guesswork on the sizes, but I’m usually quite good at that.”

“Infallible, actually. I’m always amazed,” Rey admitted.

From off at Han’s side, Leia gazed at her son for a moment, depth in her eyes.

“I’ll get to wear an Exclusive?”

Kylo’s eyes swiveled to her and stuck there, a self-conscious but pleased lift at one corner of his mouth.

“Of course. And I’d be happy to make any other pieces you might want to request.”

Kylo had built his life around clothes and design work, yet it was still so new to him – This awareness that his creations represented so much more.

“New arrivals! Oh, you are most welcome – most welcome indeed!”

“This is TC1,” Rey introduced, “Who’s been very obliging in looking after us so far.” 

She nodded her head towards the droid as it rolled across the terrace to them. “TC1, is there a bedroom ready to take their bags to?”

His gleaming head nodded feverishly as TC1 bent and effortlessly hefted up the bags. “Of course! We’re still in the process of changing linens after Master Ren and Mistress Rey copulated in four of the bedrooms yesterday, but the back ground floor bedroom is fresh and ready!”

Rey’s hands flew to cover her face with a mortified gasp, while Kylo stood stoic and red. Ever oblivious, the droid rolled off, still chattering as he led the way to the villa.

“Four bedrooms, huh? You really do make me proud, son.”

Leia immediately smacked her husband’s shoulder with a huff, but as they moved to follow the droid, she shot the embarrassed couple a conspiratorial wink. 

“Told you he would get a kick out of it,” Kylo whispered to Rey with the hint of a laugh before he went down to thank and tip the guide.

 

Rey was the first to wake on the morning of their wedding day. Clear sun streamed through the terrace doors to bathe the grand bed in glistening light. The room seemed quietly alive, with birdsongs on the doorstep and the dancing radiance of untouched morning air. Rey thought to herself, it was almost as if the elegant landscape surrounding the villa knew that this was a day of import and elation. 

The bed was the biggest Rey had ever slept in – which was saying something, considering all the master suites she and Kylo had shared in top fashion cities throughout the galaxy. It was incredibly soft, but they had no need for the vast size. They’d fallen asleep together right in the middle, Kylo cradling her close and secure against his chest, as if she might float off in the bed’s expanse. Rey wondered if he’d been touched by nerves – If he’d held her a little more tightly than usual because he was frightened she might float off entirely.

Watching the dapple of sunlight across his face, she reached through the small space between them to tuck back a stray lock of hair falling across his forehead. He didn’t stir, and she marveled. 

She honestly couldn’t remember whether or not she’d immediately been attracted to him when they met. Her first sight of him had been overshadowed by her irritation with him. Now, watching his sleeping face, lying beneath the warmth of his arm draped over her, she found it unthinkable that there could have been or ever would be anyone more beautiful. 

Holding her breath, Rey traced down the strong line of his nose. Branching to the left, she mapped his cheek to the two moles near his right ear. His lashes fluttered as Rey’s fingers skimmed to the dark flecks accenting his other cheek, brushing a fingertip lovingly over her secret favorite – just to the right side of his nose.

Watching him shift slightly in sleep, his face unconsciously turning towards her touch, Rey wished she were capable of his grand gestures. She wished she could stitch the most beautiful suit there had ever been, because speech was so flat and inadequate compared to his incandescent presence in her life. Sometimes, in the final moments of lovemaking or even in a brief, stolen meeting of eyes across the floor of a gala, Rey saw the world in his eyes: Herself reflected back, but refracted with all the radiance he saw within her.

Rey could only hope her eyes did the same. She wondered if closing himself off for so long emotionally was ironically what made him now so expressive. Hadn’t she largely done the same – Until he’d strode into her life on Jakku? 

This wasn’t the first time Rey had wondered such things, but this morning the incertitude was strongest: How had an ex-scavenger girl with no family and no history come to share her life with the most accomplished artist in the galaxy – royalty in both deed and heritage? 

The defiant slice of her that still remembered bristling at his dismissive treatment of her staff on Jakku chided herself for thinking such things. But the rest of her was so hopelessly in love with his tenderness and listening and eccentricity and self-doubt, even his mistakes and his brusque shell – She despaired that she would never be capable of evoking a sun flare of equal strength; That she could never recreate for him such soaring flight. 

Then he made a rumbling, scratchy noise from deep in his chest. Without opening his eyes, he drew her closer until he could sleepily nuzzle the top of her head. She silently savored his breathing for a minute – The slow press and withdrawal of his bare chest and the tickle of breath through her hair. 

Then he mumbled, deep and blurry, “It’s that day, isn’t it? You missed your chance to run off and escape.” He breathed out long and deep as he wrapped his arms around her fully. He murmured above her ear, “Now I’m not letting you go.”

Hooking her chin over his shoulder so she could curl in closer against him, Rey hummed. Jokes battled with sentiments on her tongue. 

“Promise you won’t ever.”

“Ever what?” he asked, still fuzzy from sleep. 

“Let me go. I don’t want to be anywhere but with you – anything but yours.”

This time, she felt Kylo’s deep breath make its escape all the way from his heart. One of his hands came to cup the back of her head, pulling them both together in a perfectly symmetrical curve. His thumb stroked the bare skin of her neck, just below her hairline. 

“I couldn’t even if I wanted to. And I will never, ever want to.”

His fingertips stroked down her neck, repeating until Rey had to tip her head upwards. She pulled away just enough so her lips could find his – both pairs slow and imprecise and unfiltered in the early morning hour. 

Rey opened her eyes again when they both stilled, the only movement Kylo’s fingers brushing her cheek. His eyes were right there before her – sparkling brighter than the morning sun and leaping more lovely than colored leaves in the wind. 

And Rey smiled – At peace and flooded with joy, because he was flying just beside her. 

 

“You’ll tell me if you think it’s too elaborate?”

“Promise. Although I doubt any hairstyle could be, paired with a wedding dress designed by Kylo.”

Rey and Leia were purposefully leaving the dress for last, tending to Rey’s hair and makeup first. Perhaps it would have made sense to look at the dress first, but Rey had been caught off guard by the butterflies of anticipation that had exploded in her chest when Kylo murmured in her ear, “The white garment bag in the back of the closet. I hope it’s everything you could have wanted,” before going to dress himself in another wing of the villa. Instead of looking right away, Rey had sat down at the mirror and began ineffectively pushing her hair around, her fingers trembling slightly.

Blessedly, Leia had appeared at that moment, coming to stand behind her and lay both hands on Rey’s shoulders.

“May I help with your hair? As a girl from Alderaan, I learned to braid before I learned to talk.”

With each gentle pull of the brush through her hair, Rey’s butterflies settled again. Leia’s fingers were gentle and careful against Rey’s scalp, precisely separating her hair into sections. It was a form of intimacy Rey had never felt before – One that wordlessly assured her that the world was a place of peace and balance.

“Now that I’ve gotten to meet you, Rey,” Leia spoke softly, her eyes lingering in her work rather than meeting Rey’s in the mirror, “I’m grateful for so much more than the chance to make things right with Ben. You are a singular young woman, and it’s easy to see why Ben loves you so. I know ... I know that if your own parents were able, nothing would stop them from being with you today. I hope you won’t think this presumptuous of me to say, but I will count myself fortunate today to call you daughter.”

When Rey heard the word, she went ramrod stiff for a moment. The effect of the word was utterly novel, and given how late in life she was to hear it, it struck straight to the quick.

Rey felt her lips trembling and bit down hard to quell them.

“Kylo… He first told me about you both only when we were planning the wedding; When I realized that it hurt to think I’d have no family to see… And now, I’m getting not only Ben, but parents as well.”

“I wish I could take credit for his selflessness in facing us for you, but I think you’ve done more good for him than I ever did.”

Rey felt Leia’s hands fall still in her hair, braid arrested in mid-air. Looking up in the mirror, Rey saw Leia’s face suspended between the fulfillment of the present and the ache of the past.

“He never said it, but… he missed you,” Rey murmured, soft but sure. “When he explained to me… He was angry with Han and he carried that with him for a long time…, but not with you.”

“I should have fought for him. My boy… So much lost time.

“In my youth, I faced the Empire and certain death plain in the face. The fear only made me more determined. But then, my son came. More precious than anything I’d ever known, anything I’d ever done… and just the thought of failing him filled me with fear that paralyzed me clean through. The day he left… I’ve played it over in my head endlessly, willing myself to speak up, to unfreeze…

“I watched him on broadcasts, every one I could. I was glad, of course, to see him successful beyond my wildest dreams, doing what he loved. But with spotlights on him and microphones in his face, I couldn’t be sure he was happy. It seemed terribly lonely at the top.”

Seeming to wake from a dream, Leia’s shoulders straightened and her fingers resumed their twisting and plaiting. Now, a smile pulled at the corner of her lips.

“Even at the risk of sounding like a tabloid gossip – I remember the first time you appeared at his side. Some red carpet, and all the reporters went into a frenzy: “Who’s the brunette on the Supreme Designer’s arm?”

Rey blushed slightly. She and Kylo lived in such a removed bubble, constantly busy and bustling from one planet or First Order ship to the next, she often forget they attracted such public interest.

Leia went on, “When I finally saw him again, after ten long years… It was truly everything I could have wished for him. As a teenager, he was so restless and uncomfortable – with himself, with the life he felt we trapped him in. I see him now and… there is such peace in him. Perhaps it was unavoidable that he had to be alone, to achieve all he has. But no one with a heart as warm as his could bear being alone for good.”

Rey could only nod, amazed and thankful for Leia’s insight. She hadn’t thought anyone else would ever really understand, given the great disparity between Kylo’s public and private personas. He had the warmest heart of anyone she’d ever know.

Leia carefully arranged the two braids atop Rey’s head, weaving them into a soft brown crown.

“Now, I’m blessed to see you two together, to see how you both look at each other… And I see everything a mother could ever want.”

 

“You sure it’s supposed to fit like this?” Han asked uncertainly, pulling at the collar again. 

Kylo good-naturedly rolled his eyes and slapped his father’s hand away so he could set the tie straight.

“It’s a fitted jacket. Trust me, the problem isn’t the jacket – It’s that you’ve never been well dressed in your life.”

Rather than a snappy retort, Han looked rather like Kylo had complimented him. “Leia would almost certainly agree, and I guess you are the expert.”

Kylo just lifted his brow in silent affirmation as he centered the tie knot and smoothed the shoulders of Han’s formal suit. He stepped back and gave a nod of satisfaction. His estimates fit perfectly.

While Rey and Leia prepared in the bridal couple’s suite, Kylo had brought his and Han’s suits to the bedroom his parents were using. Getting into his own tux had taken barely any time at all. Expert fingers made quick work of the bowtie. 

Han had raised his eyebrows, looking equally impressed and perplexed when he saw Kylo dressed. Kylo had just waved a hand. “The design is in tandem with Rey’s dress. It will make sense together.”

Then Kylo had gone into the bathroom to tend to his ever-unruly hair. Wiedling two separate bottles of product, he smoothed and teased and tousled until every strand was accounted for. He smiled unconsciously, remembering mornings when he’d finish doing his hair and emerge from the bathroom, only for Rey to bite her lip when she saw him and hook him down for a kiss – her fingers conveniently mussing his hair again. 

He still wasn’t sure about the rest of him, but he was pleased that he could at least count on his hair to hold Rey’s attention.

Coming back into the bedroom, he’d found Han looking at a loss as he stood at the mirror, attempting to knot the tie backwards.

“Here, let me.”

Once both men were dressed, they went down together to the lakeside terrace, where a shimmering canopy had been erected and overflowing arrangements of wildflowers in every conceivable color had been gathered. The officiate who would perform the marriage would arrive any time now.

Standing together at the railing overlooking the vast crystal lake that flowed seamlessly into the ocean sky, Han asked his son, “You’ve got the rings ready?”

Kylo nodded, patting the satin box tucked into his pants pocket. He’d spent a lot of time debating which pair would be right, but felt as sure as he could be that Rey would like them.

Meanwhile, Han silently looked his son up and down. (Mostly up – where in hell had the genes come from to make him so damn tall?)

“You know, I was a wreck the morning of mine and your mother’s wedding. At one point I started throwing things in a bag, convinced it would be best if I escaped in the Falcon before I ruined both our lives for good. But you look like you’ve never been calmer.”

Kylo shrugged, hands in his pockets as he looked out over the natural beauty laid before them “She calms me,” he said simply, matter-of-fact. “I’m a different person than before I met her. Before, that man couldn’t have married anyone – He certainly couldn’t have stood here talking to you.”

A strained smile passed between them with the blunt admission.

“But now, what is there to be nervous about? I love her. I don’t know if it’s possible for me to make her as happy as she makes me, but I’m going to do my damn best.”

Faint color rose to Kylo’s face as his honesty caught up with him. He looked away from Han, sliding a hand along the railing before him. 

Han felt each breath come with a poignant prickle of gratitude. For this single precious moment, Han’s ever-twisting guilt was drowned out by the intoxicating balm of his son’s happiness. By this assurance that despite his father’s shortsighted mistakes, Ben wanted for nothing. 

Han moved to stand beside Kylo – At once keenly aware he’d done nothing to deserve sharing his son’s happiness, yet helpless to hold himself back from its pull.

“Would you rather… I call you Kylo or Ben?”

Kylo had permitted Leia his birth name, but both men knew it might be different with Han. Kylo thought for a moment before deciding, “Ben is fine. For both of you.”

A beat, neither quite looking at the other, but growing accustomed to standing close.

“Ben…” Startled, Han swallowed back the emotion that welled up around the name. For the briefest moment – clear as day – he was sitting on the floor in his and Leia’s Chandrila home, rocking his infant son back to sleep. 

“This really is a beautiful suit. The best I’ve ever worn. Thank you - For letting us be here… for everything.” Han laid his own hands on the railing, leaning forward as he allowed his gaze to get lost in the blue lake waters and the comfort of the quiet moment. 

“You know… I’m sure my life could have benefitted from being better dressed,” Han said quietly.

“Well, with Rey I’ve learned that being well-dressed doesn’t count for everything, but… Yes, I’m sure it could have.”

 

The officiate stood at the raised altar, placed beneath the white canopy and covered in white flowers that spilled down from either side. The sun had lowered and the lake tide had come in, filling the terrace with the soft sound of its movements against the sand. The lake was no longer blue, but a stained glass reflection of orange and red sunsets. 

Standing at the walkway’s end a few feet before the altar, Kylo’s senses unwound in the fresh air, the melody of water, and the honeyed warmth of the sun above the horizon. They absorbed the setting on their own – His mind able to think on nothing but a single woman, not yet in his sight but just the promise of her presence and what they would soon share, so magnificent that it outshone all else.

The ancient wooden doors leading out to the terrace from the villa parted open with a musical creak. Kylo turned to see his mother emerge. She smiled at him widely, and his own returning smile came natural as breathing. Leia made the short walk to stand at her husband’s side, a bit further from the altar than Kylo. 

Han stared in wonder. Her hair was braided up elaborately, above the deep blue dress wrapped elegantly around her. At one shoulder, the fabric folded together to make flower buds. At Han’s side, Leia realized Han’s crisp suit had been made in the same blue. 

Leia caught her husband still staring and gave him a sharp raise of an eyebrow. 

“That look of surprise?”

Regaining his senses, Han gave a minute shake of his head and smiled sheepishly. “Thirty years later and you still leave me speechless.”

Leia scoffed and tossed her head, looking away towards the door to the villa and quickly hiding the silly warmth in her cheeks. 

The deep tone of the wooden doors sounded again. Kylo straightened up, his gaze fixated, and then he stopped breathing all together. 

Rey emerged with flowers in her hair, a bouquet in her hands, and a smile on her lips. Her light brown hair was braided up into a circlet, small white flowers tucked in between the strands. The only makeup on her face was a hint of glittering powder above her eyes and a deep pink sheen to her mouth. Her dress completed the miraculous picture.

The first layer of the dress was a shimmering black. Rey hadn’t been sure how she felt when she first saw Kylo’s bold choice, but the moment the dress had fallen into place against her skin, she’d known it was perfect. 

The sleeveless bodice fit to her as if she’d worn it her whole life, matching her slim frame without constricting her chest. At her hips, the waist synched and the fabric flared out slightly, falling to her ankles with all the waves and volume to swirl around her like her own private night sky. Glittering stones covered the bottom few inches of fabric. The dress fell longer in the back, leaving a trail of diamonds in her wake when she walked. At her midsection, a second layer of woven white silk tempered the black into balance. Stitched in incredibly delicate, open-spaced patterns dotted with tiny jewels, the white lace wove itself around the bodice, gathering at the small of her back in an approximation of a bow. Lace extended over a single shoulder, holding diamonds that glittered against her skin. 

When her eyes found Kylo, standing before the altar and canopy, her heart skittered erratically. With a warm, glowing shock, she took an extra moment to process the fact that he was in white. An immaculate, gleaming white suit. From head to toe, the only accents of black were the bow tie, black lapels, and black shoes. 

In her whole time of knowing him, Rey had never seen him wear white. She stood stunned in place for a moment in the terrace doorway, taking in the dark glimmer of his hair in contrast, the way the white cast his features more brightly, how the color accentuated his broad shoulders and his striking height.

Rey descended the few steps to the terrace, hardly aware of her own feet carrying her there. She felt as if she were floating – As if she were something out of a dream, and Kylo the innate sense of peace and all things sweet and good one can only possess with certainty when dreaming. Rey was aware of looking at him and only him as she crossed the terrace to his side, but it wasn’t until she stood right before him that she truly took him in. 

The trembling ripples across his face. The awed exaltation in his eyes. 

“You look like more than I could ever dream.” 

His voice broke and he blinked helplessly, wetness soaking into his long lashes. 

Speechless for a moment, Rey looked down in wonder at the dress. “I loved it the second I put it on.”

Her gaze rising to him again, Rey found his damp eyes had never left hers. 

“I don’t even see the dress,” he whispered.

Rey’s heart seemed to be beating very slowly – The world slipping to a crawl around her as she struggled to process the overwhelming richness of the moment; The flood of her own emotions threatening to sweep her off her feet, while the palpable wave of Kylo’s nearly tugged her into the sky.

Her own mouth trembling now, she reached up to cup his face between her hands. He took a deep, quaking breath as Rey lifted herself on her toes to press her lips to his cheek. 

“It’s okay, love,” she murmured as her heels found the ground again – though the rest of her continued floating. She stroked a thumb across his cheek, her gaze holding his in tender reciprocation while he did his best to blink his eyes dry.

She smiled brightly enough to light a solar system, and Kylo’s heart stuttered to a brief stand still. 

“Now, would you please not make me wait any longer to be your wife?”

A laugh took flight from Kylo’s chest in senseless levity. After Rey’s hands lowered from his face, he tipped his head down towards her to lay his lips briefly to her forehead. 

Then he straightened and offered her his arm. Rey filled her chest with a deep breath, taking in and grounding herself in the moment, before curling her hand into the crook of his elbow. They ascended to stand before the altar together, the canopy flowing in the breeze above their heads.

By the time the officiate asked for the rings and Kylo withdrew the small box from his pocket, Leia was already dangerously near tears. Han put an arm around his wife’s shoulders, his mouth pushed up in a firm smile that refused to be suppressed. 

Kylo’s hands were gentle when he took Rey’s proffered hand to slide the ring onto her finger. The delicate but substantial circlet of gold glimmered with fine-cut diamonds all around, sparkling in the sunlight. His fingers slid the ring into place with all the care and exactitude he had ever poured into his designing. 

Plucking the second ring from the box, Rey couldn’t be quite as gentle. Her hands skipped with excitement, her giddy happiness impossible to temper. When Kylo held up his left hand, Rey pulled it quickly towards her. Kylo smiled to himself with a silent laugh. Rey always got straight to business. 

His own ring was a plain band of matching gold. Watching Rey slide it into place on his finger – watching the brightness in her eyes - Kylo thought with relief that the rings truly had been perfectly chosen.

Finally, the moment came when the officiate declared them husband and wife, and stepped back to allow them their first kiss. 

Rey remembered all the times she had imagined this moment. Now, looking up into Kylo’s eyes with the Naboo sunset behind him, none of her imaginings had been anywhere close to this infinitude. 

She reached up for his shoulders at the same moment he drew her in at the waist. They fit together as seamlessly as always. 

He had never tasted more like home. She had never felt more like his greatest vision come to life in his arms. 

“I love you,” Kylo whispered, the fervent sincerity in his words hidden in the sound of his parents’ applause, so the words were for Rey alone.

Her fingers slid between his, as natural as breathing. 

Looking up into the joyful warmth of his eyes, Rey could barely find the man who hid himself from the world behind the cold, flashy veneer of fashion. Because he had never been that man to her. Anyone else might think that he had changed, to be capable of baring himself to her utterly. But Rey knew better. 

She knew she hadn’t changed him; Even though he might give her undue credit in that regard. Rey knew the truth: He’d always been capable of love and vulnerability and selfless benevolence. Those qualities had always been his essence. All he had needed was someone who saw through his desperate attempts to disguise them. Someone who drew them out, and soothed them back into his soul with the strength of compassion and the healing warmth of understanding.

“I love you, too,” she declared, loud enough for the world to know.

The two of them descended from the altar together, and turned to embrace their family.

~ 

In moments before sleep, when Kylo had her pulled close and his hands spread out across her stomach, Rey thought he must know. He must sense what she does. He must feel that same warmth radiating from her that lights her up from within.

Whenever Rey was in the bathroom alone, after a shower, she wouldn’t get dressed right away. Instead, she’d lay both hands delicately against her still-flat tummy and stare at it in the mirror, smiling to herself unconsciously. 

She knew she must be imagining it, but she wanted to believe she could feel the heartbeat. She wanted to feel the piece of Kylo living and growing within her – The part of him she carried with her always; that her body was already busy nurturing and looking after, even beyond sight. 

Lying in his arms, feeling his sleeping breath warm against her neck and both of their fingers curled together against her stomach, Rey knew she would do anything to protect that little spark of life. She could think of nothing in the entire world more precious; Nothing that would ever mean more to her than this seed of life she and Kylo created together. 

She hadn’t told him yet, but the day would come soon. For the moment, she liked to think of it as her secret treasure; Her incontrovertible proof that all she is and all Kylo is will forever be joined. That he left part of himself within her and her body treasured it, creating something beautiful from his essence – already entwining his with her own.

“What?” Kylo asked, pausing midway through lifting toast to his mouth when he noticed Rey watching him across the breakfast table out on the terrace, their last morning on Naboo. Rey only continued smiling at him and shook her head slightly.

“What were you thinking about?” he asked again when they’ve finished and the table and dishes have been cleared away. Kylo lifted Rey up onto the small wall bordering the edge of the terrace, so she’d be at the perfect height to kiss when he tilted his head up just slightly. 

With Kylo’s arms bracing her, Rey turned so she could look out across the lake, Kylo’s head resting against hers and his arms holding her close and safe. 

“Just that I’m sad to be leaving, but so glad for the future.”

Kylo’s lips brushed a kiss to her shoulder, while she pulled his hands close across her stomach. 

Their child will be his greatest creation yet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you again to each and every person who's showed interest in this story, and for each and every comment along the way. They've all meant so much to me, and I've so enjoyed sharing this world with you all. When this idea first randomly popped into my head, I certainly wasn't expecting it to burgeon into this huge project spanning 8 months... but here we are and I don't regret a single bit of it. :) Thanks again to everyone who followed this through with me, and I hope to hear your thoughts on this final installment!


	8. The Sketch In Pink

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some of you gave me baby ideas in the comments that were too cute to resist.The pregnancy, how Kylo reacts when he finds out, how he acts around the baby... These questions started following me around everywhere. And then writing every word of this turned out to be the best kind of joy. :3

Rey hovered in the doorway, watching Kylo bent over sketches at his desk. She hesitated for only a moment, knowing she had to just do it. She’d waited too long already.

Squaring her shoulders, Rey strode into the room.

“Kylo, I’m going to need some time off.”

Kylo looked up with an abrupt, puzzled expression.

“Alone? What for?” he asked his wife, the pencil in his hand still hovering over the page. 

Technically, Kylo wasn’t her boss anymore and she didn’t need to be asking at all, but Rey had been desperate all week for some way into this topic. 

“I’ll probably have to stop working for a while in about… six months or so. I probably won’t be very well.”

Now Kylo slowly lowered his pencil, setting it down on the desk. He turned towards her with concern pulling his features tight. 

“In six months? Is there something ailing you?”

“Not… ailing me exactly, but there is something happening to me…”

Rey watched the anxiety rising in Kylo’s face, watched how his eyes started to scan her over from head to toe, as if he could detect whatever might be amiss. 

Tenderness and guilt pressed upon her from opposite directions. She should have told him weeks ago. She just hadn’t known how. It would of course be huge news for him, and though she was sure he would be happy, she was nervous for the impact it would first have, and how long it would take him to recover. 

That, and they’d been in a bubble of delirious happiness ever since Naboo. The sex had never been better. Rey had wanted every possible day of passionate bliss with him, before the news transformed their lives. 

Rey held both hands out towards him, fingers extended.

“Come here.”

Kylo rose from the chair and came to her. He cupped her hands between his, thumbs rubbing the back of her hands, reassuring even without yet knowing why. 

“Don’t be nervous,” she told him softly, the smile she aimed up for him tentative and slightly on-edge, but nonetheless bright. After a drawn moment of silence, she finally whispered, “It’s actually the most wonderful thing that’s happening to me.”

She freed her hands from his, so she could guide them down towards her tummy. She had already changed into one of her baggy sleep shirts. She carefully laid Kylo’s hands flat against her stomach, through the soft material. 

Rey still remembered the first time she’d gotten in bed with him wearing it. He’d shuddered a little as he drew her close and felt the fabric. “Cotton-polyester blend,” he’d whispered the words like a curse calling up hell’s wrath.

This time, he spared not a thought for the cheap fabric. 

Rey bit her lip as she watched the lingering confusion on his face, then the movement of his gaze from her face slowly down towards where she’d placed his hands. 

Her heart pounded as she watched Kylo’s features slowly smooth into completely blank shock. 

In whispers, Kylo made multiple attempts to ask for confirmation, each ending in aborted failure.

“You…. Do you mean… Are you… ?”

“Yes,” Rey answered simply, her own whispered voice brimming with emotion and the alarming potential of tears. “It’s our child.” 

For what seemed an eternity, Kylo did nothing but blink very slowly. In the lingering silence, he echoed softly, “Our child?”

As if saying the words with his own mouth might make them something he was more capable of comprehending. 

Seconds passed. Then a full minute. Still, Kylo said nothing. His expression remained fixed in its stunned state. Rey’s heart began to twist with apprehension. 

“Kylo?” she whispered, her voice smaller and meeker than it had probably ever been in her whole life. If Kylo had had any presence of mind at all in that moment, her wavering tone would have sent him into a protective fit. 

“I know we didn’t plan for this to happen so soon, but together I know we can do just fine,” Rey said, trying to convince herself just as much. “Together, we have everything we need…”

“Need,” Kylo echoed blankly, stopping Rey short. “I…I think I need a minute alone.”

His hands drew back from Rey’s stomach as if moved by a power beyond him. 

Rey swore she had forgotten how to breathe. She barely managed to swallow, then choke out, “Okay. I-… I’m going to go to bed. You’ll come when you’re ready?”

“Yes,” Kylo whispered in nothing more than breath. His eyes scurried away from Rey as he started to sink back towards the chair. 

“Okay,” Rey repeated softly. She watched Kylo for a second, but he wouldn’t raise his gaze to her from the floor. Rey could see the tension in his jaw and shoulders – Signs of an internal whirlwind even as his face remained a blank mask, firm in place to keep the internal chaos in check. 

For a flash of a moment, Rey wanted to rage at him. 

_This is one of the biggest moments of our lives. It should be one of the happiest. How can your internal complexities overwrite this?_

She started backing up, unsure if she had the same hold over her emotional distress Kylo seemed to. (In any other circumstance, she would have laughed at the role reversal.) Before she became conscious of her own actions, she turned and fled the room as quickly as she could.

Rey had to focus on taking a single breath after another, her hands trailing against the walls on her way to the bedroom for reassurance of something solid. Something that would guide her steps, one after another. The entire world seemed changed – Everything certain and shining now dimmed and tumbling. 

Finally lying in bed, the bedroom dark and lonely, Rey laid both hands over her stomach. How could her little treasure have thrown her into this chasm? How had her feelings towards her own child become so muddled so quickly? Was this already her first test as a mother, and had she already failed? What did it say about her if her husband’s reaction held so much sway over her own heart? In all else, Rey had always seemed the untouchable, rooted one; While Kylo’s self-possession was subject to blowing of in the wind.

 _But isn’t this different than all else?_ Rey thought miserably, unable to stop a sniffle despite her frustration at the sound. _How can I bear it, if Kylo doesn’t treasure this the same way I do?_

Kylo had said on the night he proposed to her that he wanted her to be his future; That the First Order was less important to him than she was. A baby wouldn’t mean they’d need to leave the First Order immediately, but it would certainly change their priorities. What if this was too soon, too quick for him? What if he never wanted children at all… The thought made Rey’s lungs spasm and her breathing break into uneven bursts. 

Rey couldn’t be sure how long she laid there in the dark, at the brink of tears and desperately trying to reclaim the joy she’d felt only a short time ago. She didn’t hear the footsteps approaching the bedroom until Kylo’s voice sounded – Careful and reticent from the doorway. 

“Rey? Can I... turn the light on?”

“Better not,” Rey muttered in response, her voice dark in helpless bitterness, yet not quite concealing the lingering precipice of tears. Kylo sucked in breath hard, his chest knotting up when he heard Rey’s voice, and when his eyes adjusted enough in the darkness to see how she was lying curled up – Alone and small in the wide bed.

He’d had some prescience of his mistake, but only now did he realize the full consequences of his weakness.

Shame and lingering self-doubt dogging his steps, Kylo moved towards the bed. Hearing his approach, Rey could no longer bear the strain of suspense. She pushed herself up and towards him, moving to the edge of the bed so she could reach for him and demand that he just talk. Just talk to her instead of letting himself get lost in his own head, and shutting her out along with the rest of the world.

Rey’s desperate anger stalled, as Kylo came to the edge of the bed and sunk to his knees before her. Rey was keenly aware of each breath, each heart beat, as one of Kylo’s ungloved hands lifted to her knee. Then he lowered himself all the way to the floor, so he could lay his head upon her legs. 

The way he had his head turned, Rey couldn’t see his face – Only the dark tangle of his hair splayed across her lap. When his voice finally came, it was the tone she had only heard from him a few seldom times – The night he proposed on Coruscant, when he’d told her he loved her during their wedding, and a few late nights when he felt gripped by the need to tell her in ever-faltering whispers how much she meant to him. It was nothing like him and at the same time the truest form of him. It was a whole world of gentleness and safety and unspeakable beauty – A world she could never have even dreamed back on Jakku.

“I know I’ve often had to ask for your forgiveness, and you’ve already given it in abundance – far more than I deserve. But to my shame I must ask for yet more, and this time I realize my offenses are numerous. First, that I have to speak of apologies and mistakes on this night that should be our happiest…”

Rey’s heart was beating so loudly, it threatened to drown out Kylo’s words. Rey had to be sure she’d heard right.

“Our happiest?” Rey echoed faintly. “Kylo, tell me, are you happy?” Now the tears rushed up, undeniable and overwhelming. “Because that’s all that matters. That’s the only thing…”

“Of course I am.” 

Kylo stopped short, unable to go on when he heard the jagged gasp of breath that escaped Rey above him – Still laced with tears but releasing a burden of unimaginable weight. 

Kylo’s understanding and regret rushed up over him, drowning him in a choking wave. Rey had given him everything miraculous in the galaxy; Tonight, she’d done it in just three words. And he’d proven himself utterly unfit, utterly undeserving.

But he _wanted_ to be better for her; Stronger for their child. He knew with unshakeable clarity: To be the husband she needed, to be a _father_ , he could no longer let himself succumb to the pitfalls of insecurity and second-guessing that too often kept him trapped within himself. Rey had been the only one who could always reach him there and pull him back to freedom, but she shouldn’t have to anymore. 

The image came to his mind of Rey’s body growing with their child. Kylo wanted to be her support and her strength – Everything she could ever need. And if she believed he could… What in the world could be stronger than that? How could he think to second-guess her faith?

Kylo lifted his head from her lap, just enough so he could sit back and find her eyes in the dim light. He willed his own eyes to mirror and show her the resolution that had crested in his heart. He willed himself the power to fix and move past his mistakes, and the strength to become the force banishing her tears and keeping her happiness steadfast. 

“Of course I am,” he repeated in a hush. One of his hands found hers and his heart thudded painfully when he felt how tightly she gripped his fingers. He could barely make out the glimmer of her wet eyes in the dark, but he saw the way her shoulders shuddered in irregular, painful breath as she watched him. 

He went on, “I was overwhelmed. The happiness and the wonder of it – It seemed so huge, so powerful, I felt so small and weak compared to that feeling. Rey, I… I have to admit I’d never thought of being a father, so when my first impression of myself in that role was such massive inadequacy… I didn’t know how to react.”

He took a deep breath, focusing hard on channeling the newfound calm within him into appropriate words. There were never words good enough for Rey – Never enough or words strong enough to match the way she existed in his world, but this was a problem he had long become accustomed to. 

“It was a terribly selfish reaction of me. I would do anything to go back and redo that moment. So I could tell you the truth immediately.”

Kylo reached for Rey’s other hand. He drew them together on her lap, cupping them both between his own hands. He lifted her hands between them, pressing a soft kiss to their backs. Then he lifted his gaze to his wife’s face again. 

“Since I met you, you’ve continued to bring unimaginable new joys into my life. This is the greatest of all. The truth is that I’m not ready, but no matter whether we planned this or not, I know without a single doubt that you’ll be a magnificent mother. And when I think of the fact that the baby will be _ours_ , that I’ll become a parent together with you, Rey… I _want_ to be ready. I want to share every day, every moment of this wonder with you. I think of how loving you has changed me for the better, and I know that through loving our child, I’ll find what I need to be a father.”

Rey breathed shallowly but steadily, letting Kylo’s words sink into her and the determined love in his eyes pull her free of the disorienting uncertainty that had almost consumed her. Never in her whole life had she felt something so debilitating – A crack in the foundations of her entire world. 

But Rey had heard the resonance in Kylo’s words – The gentle but unquestionable assurance behind them. He had left her side tonight at the most inopportune time of vulnerability, but had returned to her determined and steadfast. Rey searched his eyes for the fervent conviction she usually only found when they were alone, and he aflame with his love for her. Now, the world clicked back into comprehension around her, when she saw all that conviction and more. 

Finally sure that he’d been touched the same way as her by the terrifying but breathless prospect of their future with the baby already growing inside her; and seeing that he was here with her, here for her… Rey lapsed into the returning warmth of safety and comfort.

The tears purged themselves in a sudden rush. Rey crumpled towards him at the same moment he surged to his knees so he could gather her close against his chest, wrapping her up entirely in his arms as she cried the last hour away on his shoulder. 

“Don’t ever do that to me again,” she hiccupped, somehow still fearsome even as she cried. 

Kylo kissed her hair, her ear, her temple, then all of them over again.

“Never,” he vowed. His arms tightened around her still further. “We’re going to be parents together. I will always be at your side, always with you. Even if it means I have moments of mistakes or weakness, I will share them all.”

“Good,” Rey murmured, breathing him in as she curled in still closer to her husband. “Because I love all of you – even the mistakes and the worries. And I know our baby will, too.”

“Maker… We’re having a baby,” Kylo breathed, letting out a breath of laughter, nervous and awed. “When did you know?”

“Just before we left Naboo.”

“How far do you think you are?”

“I went to the doctor already, and she guessed about two months. I thought we’d go for a more complete exam after I tell you… But you’ve still got time to get used to the idea.”

Kylo kissed her temple again, then her lips, very gently. 

“You’re carrying our child. I don’t need time to get used to it – Just to believe it’s real.”

Smiling now as her tears finally waned, Rey looped her arms around Kylo’s neck and rested her forehead against his.

“It’s real, Kylo. Our little one’s with us already, even now.”

Kylo exhaled a trembling breath. He bent his head, pressing his tremulous smile to Rey’s neck and holding her as close as his arms could bring her. 

~

Telling the news to their staff went easily. Kylo didn’t want to repeat another dramatic announcement such as the one regarding their wedding, so Rey took an alternate but no less effective method. She pulled Nora and Lis aside one morning with a “secret” to share with them. By the end of that very same day, every single staff member she passed stopped her to offer excited congratulations.

True to his word, Kylo was her steadfast partner through every high and low of her pregnancy. He made noises about her stopping work, but knew to fall quiet when she met the suggestion with a fierce glower. Rey kept on working until only two months remained, when the heaviness of her body started making it hard to keep up to her usual pace. At that point, Kylo cut back his hours as much as possible. He wanted to be there as much as he could to comfort Rey through morning sickness, to carry her to bed when fatigue overwhelmed her, and take her to the regular check-ins with the doctor he’d hired to stay aboard the Supremacy during the pregnancy. 

He didn’t even balk in the face of the big decisions. He was the one to suggest entirely clearing out the top level of the Supremacy to have full, expanded living quarters built – Complete with a spacious nursery and a thickly carpeted living room for the baby to crawl and someday toddle around freely. 

He stayed up late countless nights with Rey, discussing all the possible planets and places where they might want to have their permanent home built. It was important to both of them that their child know more than the metal corridors and air-locked enclosures of the First Order command ship. Rey and Kylo had been happy to call the ship home, but now it was time to plan their own future, independent of the company. 

At first, Kylo equivocated he wanted no caretaker or nanny for their child. He wanted the child to stay under his or her parents’ care at all times. 

“Our child will remember us, not droids or some stranger. I don’t want him or her ever wondering why we weren’t there, or what was more important to us.” 

Kylo’s hands had been balled into trembling fists when he said it. Rey bit back a retort, seeing this wasn’t just a stubborn fancy. Kylo was speaking about himself.

Rey liked the idea in theory, but knew from the beginning it would be impossible. It wasn’t a question of their willingness to stay “home” with the baby, but the simple fact that the First Order couldn’t run in both of their absences – Not with such short notice. Given a couple years, they planned to train a group of executive staff to hand over their roles to, so the First Order’s operations would no longer rely on their daily presence. But that was a long-term plan.

They had a brief fight when Kylo tried to be practical about each of their time commitments, but just ended up being presumptuous. 

“So I’m inessential, is what you’re saying,” Rey flared, an eyebrow raising dangerously. 

“Of course not,” Kylo tried to be placating. “I’m just saying between the two of us… If we decide it’s a priority that the baby always stay with one of us…”

Rey cut him off quickly, “I agree that our child is more important than all the First Order put together, but I resent your implication that my job is less important than yours. I’d like to see you try managing everything on your own while I spend every day in the nursery.” She sighed, shaking her head. “Let me give you a tip, Kylo. Never tell your wife her job is less important than yours. It won’t go well.”

Eventually, Kylo relented. “No droids,” Kylo still stipulated like iron, and Rey agreed whole-heartedly. With a month to go until the expected due date, he set up interviews with all the best caretakers they could find. Rey had never seen Kylo more intimidating. 

She was convinced the woman they finally hired could protect their child from a charge of wild Rathtar without batting an eye, after she held up so well under Kylo’s scathing quick fire questioning. When Kylo and Rey finally moved into their completed and expanded living quarters on the Supremacy’s top level, they had quarters prepared one floor below for the caretaker. She’d refrained from admitting until they offered her the job, but the woman was an ardent First Order devotee. She’d been only too happy to move in a few weeks before the due date, and fell practically speechless when Rey promised her salary would be supplemented every month with a piece of her choosing from the newest lines. 

~

Mere weeks in sight of the due date, Rey had never been so restless for Kylo physically. She always seemed cold or uncomfortable, outside of his arms. Every day she felt the baby moving and kicking more, struggling to find space in its increasingly confining home. But when Kylo laid his hands over her belly, the baby would relax into stillness. 

Rey felt anxious whenever Kylo was gone from her sight – Her own need for him paired with their baby’s natural longing for the father. Sleeping was impossible without him in bed with her. Prone to exhaustion as she was, being eight months pregnant, Kylo fell into routine of coming back to their quarters twice a day so she could nap in his embrace. 

He wouldn’t sleep himself – He’d listen to the sound of her breathing, imagine he could feel their baby’s heartbeat with the hand he rested on Rey’s round tummy, and wonder how everything precious in the whole galaxy could fit into the span of his arms. 

To Rey’s intense relief, Kylo’s desire for her never waned, even with her changed body of motherhood. For Rey, the searing intimacy of lovemaking with him had never been sweeter or more fulfilling. When the size of her belly started getting in the way, Kylo had figured out how to angle her hips back so he could take her slowly and gently, spooned in tight behind her. 

Even outside of sex, Kylo was moved by the constant need to touch her. He could spend hours alone just tracing his fingertips along the stretched, smooth skin of her tummy. 

(“What if I get stretch marks?” Rey had whispered anxiously one night. Kylo had pressed a soothing kiss to her neck, knowing full well that it was only the pregnancy moving her to such a silly concern. 

“Then I’ll have something to kiss and remind me how beautiful you looked, like this.”)

He was enthralled by the feel of her breasts in his hands, heavier and fuller than usual. He was entranced by the way every inch of her skin seemed to glow. He could lose himself in how intensely responsive she was to his touch, how expressive and sensitive she became. He loved simply listening to her unraveling noises, when he held her and stroked his fingers with slow purpose between her legs. 

Mere hours out of her presence felt unbearable. The more pregnant she became, the stronger her gravity pulled him. He’d always felt like a mere moon in revolution around the radiance of her sun, but as she bloomed with their child, she drowned out everything else in irrelevant shadow. 

They were in the kitchen, Kylo attempting to cook breakfast, when the time came. Rey gave a brief cry, collapsing into a chair. Kylo whirled and only had to meet Rey’s eyes for a moment to know. 

In a moment of unflappable calm, he commed the med bay to prepare for their arrival, went to retrieve the bag Rey already had packed, and summoned the medical droids. They brought a levitation stretcher Kylo lifted Rey onto, and he held her hand as he walked beside her on the way down to the med bay. 

Rey’s breathing was already spiking, her face already fighting a grimace. She clutched his hand with all her strength.

“You’ll stay with me, promise? The whole time?”

Kylo squeezed her hand in return. 

“Every minute.”

 

Seven hours later, Rey gave birth to their baby daughter. At the bedside, tears welled up in Kylo’s eyes when one of the nurses placed the tiny, swaddled newborn in his arms. She’d been crying a soft wail since she entered the world, but fell quiet in her father’s arms. He didn’t quite know how to hold her – She was so tiny and delicate in his big hands. He just gazed at her, not daring to move a muscle as his vision swam. 

“What should her name be?” Rey asked softly. She was exhausted, but the sight of Kylo gazing in loving wonder at their baby filled her with a resurgence of luminous energy.

They’d talked about possible names, of course, but hadn’t been able to decide. Rey had been confident they would simply know, when they finally saw their baby.

Kylo realized she had been right. He looked up at Rey and found her nodding at him, waiting to hear. Kylo drew breath carefully as he looked back down to their daughter. 

“Thalia.”

Rey smiled wide, and now a tear escaped her eyes as well.

“It’s perfect.”

After the baby had been taken to where she could sleep, Kylo leaned over the bed to gather Rey in his arms, speechless and overcome. He pressed countless kisses to her hair, as Rey sniffled softly against his shoulder.

“You were perfect. She’s perfect,” Kylo whispered. The word had never before been one in his vocabulary. Rey nodded, still softly crying even as she agreed: “Perfect.”

~

Rey stopped work entirely for the next few weeks, spending all her time with the baby. She hadn’t planned on stopping wholesale, but she didn’t feel capable yet of leaving little Thalia for any long stretch of time. 

She felt mildly embarrassed, considering her spirited rebuff of Kylo’s earlier suggestion that she stop working to stay with the baby. But she simply couldn’t have imagined the way her little baby daughter would capture every corner of her heart and attention. She couldn’t have imagined what it would feel like to hold her, to nurse her, to see those little eyes blinking up at her. Even after the birth, the baby still felt like part of her, perhaps even more so now that Rey could see and interact with her. 

Kylo slowly learned how to hold her, though he still showed flashes of apprehension whenever Rey first handed the baby to him. But once he managed to carefully arrange her in the crook of his arm so her head was properly supported, he could sit with her for hours without moving, and without complaint from either of them. 

Little Thalia always seemed calm and content whenever Kylo held her. Rey loved just watching them, or listening to the baby coo up at her father while Rey got some rest herself. 

Thalia’s favorite past time was sucking on anything and everything she could fit in her little mouth. Her favorite things were fingers. The caretaker and even Rey found it a little difficult to bear past a few minutes, but Kylo alone didn’t seem to mind. When he held her, she would lift her little hands in the air until Kylo gave her his free hand and let her pull one of his fingers to her mouth. He’d let her suck on one of his fingertips to her little heart’s content, the whole time until she fell asleep. 

Kylo minimized his work hours as much as possible – Only making appearances at the most essential meetings and spending time on the most pressing design portfolios. During the stretches of the day when he was out, Rey had the caretaker’s help. The caretaker proved wholly reliable, and Thalia seemed more used to the woman every day, making Rey feel reassured that eventually she would be able to return to work and leave the baby in capable hands during the daytime. 

One night about a month after the birth, Rey sat curled on the bed with Thalia in her arms, nursing. Kylo came in from the bathroom and stood momentarily arrested by the sight. Rey wore loose sleep pants and no shirt. She’d pulled her hair over one shoulder, her breast bared for the baby’s seeking mouth. Thalia had one chubby hand raised aimlessly in the air as she suckled, little fingers opening and closing at nothing in particular. Rey was smiling a gentle, adoring smile at their tiny baby girl. 

Kylo came to the bed and carefully slid in beside his wife, moving slowly so as not to jostle her. Thalia’s fingers were still opening and closing in the air, so Kylo extended one of his own for her to grab onto. Her tiny fingers circled his securely, holding him there. 

Rey looked up at him and smiled – The picture of fulfillment. 

Kylo felt as if his heart were beating all the way up in his throat. He felt sweetly warm – A serenity and contentment filling him purer than anything to which he could put words. To him, the world had always needed beautifying or fixing. Until now. Now, he knew nothing within his imagination could be more pure or powerful than his own reality.

He swallowed hard, unspeakably grateful and lost for words.

As their baby girl continued nursing, Kylo wrapped his free arm around Rey to gently draw her in close. Rey shifted carefully but happily, settling herself against Kylo’s chest with Thalia propped in her arms, the baby’s feet spilling into Kylo’s lap.

“Do you think she’ll sleep soon?” Kylo murmured.

“Probably. She didn’t want her nap this afternoon.”

“Did you get your nap this afternoon?”

“No, when baby doesn’t sleep, Mommy doesn’t either,” Rey said, uncomplaining. 

“You need your rest too, Rey.”

“To be honest… I know it’s silly, but if she’s awake, I’d rather be awake too, with her.”

Kylo smiled a little to himself, lifting a hand to stroke Rey’s hair as she pillowed her head against his shoulder 

“I understand.” He gave a soft hum of a chuckle. “Look at us besotted parents.”

Rey rubbed her cheek against his shoulder lightly as she smiled in amusement. “And I thought I could be a collected, non-obsessive mother. How silly of an expectation was that?” 

Thalia wriggled in her arms a little, yawning. Rey adjusted her as she latched on again, sucking more sleepily now. 

Rey smiled to herself, thinking how wonderfully ridiculous it all was – How the smallest little things her baby daughter did could simply overwhelm her.

Rey traced the shape of Thalia’s round cheeks and jaw with a feather-light touch. 

“But how could I not be consumed by her?” Rey mused, warm and comfortable in Kylo’s embrace while she grew sleepy in sync with the baby. “She’s so beautiful. I see you in her eyes and her nose. Even when I first realized I was pregnant, I loved just the idea of a part of you joined with a part of me. Now, when I see her… It’s everything I already feel for you, and somehow even more, made new. 

“I love sharing her with you. I love to hold her and see myself and you reflected back at the same time. We might not have planned it, but she’s ours and we made something so wonderful together…”

Blinking rapidly and quiet with awe, Kylo bent his head to brush his lips against the top of Rey’s head. Rey closed her eyes, sweet relaxation wrapping her up completely as she felt his tender attention. He didn’t need to say anything. Not when he was here, holding both Rey and their daughter together in his arms. 

A minute passed before Kylo whispered to her gently, “You know… I would be quite happy to never leave this room again, if it meant we could stay like this always.”

Thalia had already fallen asleep (her grip had finally loosened around Kylo’s finger), and Rey was halfway there herself. But she heard enough of his sentiment to smile sleepily and whisper how much she loved him. 

After Rey drifted off to sleep together with the baby, Kylo continued holding them both for a time. While his hands savored the warmth of Rey’s bare skin, he watched their daughter sleeping. 

He supposed Rey was right that there was something in Thalia’s nose of the straight prominence of his own, and her eye color (when those eyes were open) was indeed similar to his own. But the features he’d given more notice to were the tufts of hair that had begun to grow – the same chestnut shade as Rey’s; And the delicate shapes of her brow, cheeks, and chin – all tiny copies of Rey’s facial structure. 

While Rey had said she loved seeing Kylo’s features mixed with her own, he only hoped his nose wouldn’t look out of place on his daughter’s face, when she grew into her mother’s features.

 _At least she wasn’t burdened with my ears,_ Kylo thought wryly. 

Kylo remained still, holding his wife and daughter as they slept, until Rey turned closer to him in her sleep. She inadvertently shifted the baby and elicited a soft whine from the little girl. Luckily, the baby slept on. 

They’d been warned not to let Thalia sleep in their bed while she was still so small, so Kylo carefully maneuvered Rey to lie down while lifting Thalia in the crook of one arm. Making every effort not to wake her, he carried the baby to the crib they’d set up beside their own bed. He gently set her down there and covered her with one of the blankets piled up in the crib. In lieu of a spoken goodnight, he stroked the top of her head once with gentle fingertips.

Then Kylo returned to the bed. He pulled the covers over both of them, and Rey gave a sighing sound of happiness in her sleep as Kylo curled himself around her. 

“We did make something wonderful together, didn’t we, Rey?” he whispered into his sleeping wife’s hair. 

Three hours later, they were woken by the sound of Thalia’s cries. Blearily, Rey automatically began fumbling with the blankets. Kylo caught her before she could get up.

“No, you sleep. I’ll take care of her.”

Kylo got up and went to the crib as Rey burrowed back down in the blankets. She watched with a sleepy smile as Kylo carefully lifted Thalia up and felt if she needed to be changed. He carried her out in the direction of the nursery and her changing table, as she sniffled and yawned against his shoulder. 

Rey was already sound asleep again when her husband rejoined her in bed. 

~

When Thalia turned three months, Rey began transitioning back to work. Kylo had never made a single comment to the effect, but she could tell from his silently building stress levels that her absence was causing some degree of operations difficulties. 

Still, Kylo’s initial vehemence that they remain a constant presence in their child’s life stuck with her. As she got back to doing scheduling for them both, she blocked out at least an hour each day for her to retire and spend time with the baby. 

For the first few weeks, Rey felt a bit uneasy with the constant handovers between herself and the caretaker during the workdays. Thalia appeared to be mostly okay with the arrangement, seeming content and bubbly when Rey dropped in each day. But Rey still felt a tad on-edge, until she found time to steal off and check on Thalia herself; To confirm each day that her daughter was happy and well-tended to under the caretaker’s eye. 

A few weeks in, Rey entered their living quarters to the sound of Thalia’s loud, upset cries. She dashed in to find the caretaker in the living room, gently bouncing Thalia and rubbing her back in attempt to soothe her. 

“What is it?” Rey asked urgently, hurrying forward to hold her arms out for her daughter.

“I don’t think she’s feeling well,” the caretaker said, her voice calm but an anxious pull to her mouth as she handed the baby to Rey. “She ate fine this morning, she had a nap, I just changed her… I can’t think of anything else.”

Rey’s heart pounded as Thalia cried loudly near her ear. She didn’t feel warm or feverish to the touch, but perhaps it was a stomachache or early teething or…

In an equal bid to calm herself, Rey hushed and hummed to the baby as she bounced her in slow, wide arcs. 

It didn’t help. Rey continued cooing and murmuring to her and trying to rock her, but Thalia kept wailing and kicking restlessly in her arms. Her little lungs seemed tireless.

Desperation crept over Rey, until a half hour passed and there was only one thing left to do.

Her own face flushed with distress, Rey handed Thalia to the caretaker. “That’s it – I’m going to get Kylo.”

“What-… You are?” the caretaker asked, eyes wide. She hadn’t seen much of Kylo since she was hired, as she usually tended to the baby during the day while Kylo was busy bustling around the ship. 

“Yes. He’ll help. I’ll be right back,” Rey said shortly before dashing from the room again. 

Remembering Kylo’s schedule from going over it with him that morning, she knew she would find him in the Reception Hall. Her mind had no space or patience to remember that he was receiving a trade union delegation today, including some twenty representatives from different star systems where the First Order had production facilities and employed local workers. 

Rey dashed to the elevator that would take her down, then across to the other elevators that would take her back up. The Reception Hall was also on the Supremacy’s top floor, but on the opposite side of the ship. It was the only remaining part of the top level that hadn’t been taken over by their living quarters.

When the elevator doors opened and Rey burst out, she found the Reception Hall had been outfitted with a long table lined with chairs. Each chair was full and every pair of eyes turned to fix on her – Including Kylo’s, who sat at the head of the table.

“What is it, Rey?” he asked, not unkindly but primly. It didn’t give Rey pause. She was his personal assistant _and_ his wife. She knew full well how accomplished he was at putting on the behavior appropriate for the varied demands and settings of the design world. 

She responded quickly, managing the appearance of equal composure, “Something’s the matter with Thalia. She won’t calm.”

Kylo stood quickly, ignoring the range of perplexed and irritated looks the people at the table were giving each other. 

Already moving towards Rey and the door, Kylo announced, “My apologies to you all, but it will be necessary to adjourn this meeting for one hour.”

Protests and complaints sounded along the table. Kylo met Rey’s eyes as he passed her to call the elevator. She nodded to him slightly, then stepped farther into the room as he passed into the elevator. 

Spreading her hands placatingly, she addressed the affronted assemblage, “Ladies and gentleman, I do apologize that a pressing matter requires Designer Ren’s immediate attention. I assure you all that the First Order holds our partnership agreements in the highest esteem, and we place great value in your support…”

 

“How long has she been crying?’ Kylo asked without preamble as he swept into their living quarters. The caretaker looked up with a jolt from where she’d been sitting beside the crib in the living room, at a loss as the baby continued to shriek. 

“About two hours now,” she replied, sounding haggard. 

Without saying or asking anything further, Kylo quickly crossed the room. He reached down into the crib and lifted Thalia in his arms. He took a moment settling her carefully against his shoulder, one hand gently cupping the back of her head while his other securely propped her in place. 

Remaining completely silent, he began walking a slow circuit between rooms. By the time he passed back through the living room, he’d begun rocking her ever so slightly. Thalia’s little fists balled up in the black fabric of Kylo’s cloak where it billowed over his shoulder, and at first her wails endured. 

Still silent, Kylo continued his slow tread from one room to the other, paired with the slight rocking motion back and forth. But then, as the minutes passed, the caretaker noticed with disbelieving relief that the child’s cries began growing softer, then dropping off for seconds at a time here and there.

Within the following minutes, Thalia’s cries slowly ebbed away. Kylo continued walking and rocking. A few more slow circuits, and the next time Kylo passed through the room, Thalia was fast asleep on his shoulder.

He walked one more round for good measure. Rey returned just as Kylo approached the crib again. 

The caretaker hurried to her side with a smile of profound relief. “Amazing. He got her to sleep.”

“I knew he could,” Rey whispered back, feeling all the anxiety and tension in her finally drain away in the newfound silence as Thalia slept. “She adores him and he always stays so calm around her.”

Rey watched in both fondness in admiration as Kylo ever so carefully lowered Thalia back down into the crib. He hovered there for a minute, watching his daughter until he was assured her sleep wasn’t only fitful. Finally, he straightened and came over to Rey. 

“Thank you,” Rey whispered. 

Kylo shrugged off her thanks, aware of the caretaker standing near. 

“If she might be ill, we should speak to the doctor right away,” he suggested.

Rey nodded. “If that wasn’t just a fluke and she cries again when she wakes, I’ll comm right away. But she doesn’t have a temperature – We checked already.”

“Good,” Kylo said with a nod. He looked towards the door, before extending a hand to briefly rest on Rey’s arm. “Come get me again if you need anything, alright? For now, I have to get back.”

Rey nodded firmly. “Of course. They’re waiting for you.”

Kylo left again in a swirl of black cloak. The caretaker watched the door for a moment with an understanding yet wistful smile. Then she looked towards Rey.

“Well, I get now why you’re _both_ so smitten with him.”

Rey gave a soft, surprised laugh.

“Oh, yes. There are many sides to him, but that was the real one.”

~

By the time Thalia turned six months, Rey had fully reintegrated into her job. The First Order was back to operating at full capacity, and both Rey and Kylo had found a balance between their work and private lives that kept them ever-accessible to their child. They were still the ones feeding her every morning and putting her to bed every night.

At least once every month, they would take a few days off to bring Thalia down to whatever planet the Supremacy was currently passing by. The baby might have everything she needed on the ship, but Rey and Kylo loved watching her crawl through grass and sand and dirt, getting her hands filthy and giggling as she clapped them together. They wanted to make sure she got plenty of fresh air and real sunlight and chances to explore the whole big world out there, little by little. 

She’d gone silent the first time she saw snow, her little eyes round with wonder as the soft icicles melted on her face. She’d shouted the first time she saw the ocean. Her parents weren’t sure at first if it was fear or delight. Rey carried her slowly closer to the water, watching her face to gauge her reaction. When the first wave broke over Rey’s feet and splashed them with water, Thalia grinned and wriggled with a jubilant yell. 

Rey had looked back with a beaming smile towards Kylo, where he stood further up on the shore. He’d never particularly liked the sea, but watching his wife wading in the shallows with their delighted daughter in her arms, he knew this ocean had given him a memory he would always treasure.

Then, just when the routines had become comfortable, the caretaker caught a bad cold. They gave her a few days off to recover, and so Thalia wouldn’t be exposed. But then Rey started getting symptoms as well. 

“I can still manage her,” Rey said in a stuffy voice, between sneezes.

“You need to rest yourself,” Kylo replied, shaking his head. 

“But who’s going to watch her?” Rey asked, wiping her nose. “Both of us can’t stay in.”

“That’s true.” Kylo looked thoughtful for a moment, chewing his bottom lip. “But just because I can’t stay in doesn’t mean I can’t watch her.”

Rey just stared at him for a moment, not sure if it was all the congestion in her head making her thoughts so slow to catch up. 

Finally, she asked blankly, “You don’t mean…”

Kylo shrugged, rolling his shoulders to stand up straight. “I don’t see any other choice.”

And so, the next morning Rey helped Kylo strap on the baby sling they rarely used. He’d left off his jackets and cloaks for the day, wearing just a simple dark dress shirt under the thick, crisscrossing grey straps of the sling. 

“You get to go to work with Daddy, honey,” Rey cooed to Thalia who was still waking up, blinking sleepily with two fingers stuffed in her mouth. 

Fortunately, Thalia stayed relaxed and pliant enough for Rey to thread her feet into the sling’s leg holes, and settle the rest of her into the cradle of fabric against Kylo’s chest. Only her legs and the top of her head were visible behind the cradle of the sling. 

“You’ll have to come back around midday so I can feed her,” Rey said, stroking back Thalia’s downy hair. 

“That’s fine. You said my only meeting is the morning session with Advertising, right?”

Rey nodded, finally looking up from her baby to her husband’s face. Kylo touched Rey’s cheek with the backs of his fingers.

“Get some rest before then, alright?”

Rey nodded, smiling lazily as she automatically tipped her head towards Kylo’s fingers.

“I’ll do my best.” 

He leaned down to aim for her lips, but Rey halted him with a hand on his shoulder.

“I don’t want to get you sick, too,” she croaked. 

“Rey, I’m sure it’s too late for that.” But he settled for kissing her forehead instead. 

 

Only an hour into the day, already it was the talk of the entire ship. 

_“Rey’s sick so Boss has the baby!”_

_“I just passed Ren and he’s walking around with a baby sling!”_

_“She’s the cutest little thing I’ve ever seen.”_

_“See if you can go get a look!”_

Of course, Kylo understood Thalia was indeed in the upper echelons of attractive children, and of course everyone wanted to see her and adore her, but he nevertheless maintained his business focus throughout the day. 

He entered the Advertising meeting without an eyelash amiss from his usual solemn purpose. At least half of the people in the room rose to their feet with excited gasps when they saw the baby attached to their boss, smiles rising around the table. 

Kylo froze them all with a stern finger held up before his mouth. 

“She’s napping. Be seated and take care to speak softly.”

Kylo took his usual seat and began the meeting in whispered tones without missing a beat.

A half hour later, the team leader’s advertising pitch for Kylo’s newest line of formal wear for non-humanoid markets was abruptly interrupted, by the sound of a soft yawn and babble from the baby sling. 

Kylo looked down for a moment and reached one hand into the sling, when the baby’s noises wavered at the edge of discontent. Thalia’s little hands could be seen lifting up out of the sling to grab onto one of her father’s fingers and pull his hand down to her. 

She fell quiet again and Kylo looked up, expectant. The entire Advertising team were staring, a mixture of enamored and astounded expressions. 

“Well?” Kylo demanded after a long moment of silence passed. “Let’s attempt to focus, if you please. Continue.”

When he adjourned the meeting, he finally gave into the silently imploring looks around the table. 

“Fine, come see her.”

The entire team scrambled from their seats to gather behind Kylo’s chair and see Thalia. 

“She’s just darling.”

“You have a beautiful daughter, sir.”

A smile finally escaped Kylo as he adjusted her in the sling slightly.

“Thank you. I know.”

~

As Thalia grew, she resembled her mother more and more in miniature. She’d inherited her mother’s temperament too – every bit of Rey’s spunk and determination. But she took after Kylo in other ways. 

Kylo made it a habit of taking her to his studio with him, whenever he worked into the evenings. When she was still small, he would spread out her blanket on the floor beside his desk and let her roll around with her toys and stuffed animals as he worked. But as soon as she was old enough to hold a pencil herself, she wanted to color and draw just like her daddy. 

When she turned two, she had her own little chair at Kylo’s desk, where she would make herself busy drawing together with him. Upon finishing each work, she would present her creation to Kylo with a proud grin.

“Dada look!”

Each time, he would accept her proffered drawing, take a moment puzzling and nodding over it seriously, then smile at her and reach over to pat her hair.

“Bold color choice.”

“Very original line work.”

Thalia would beam to herself and wriggle in her seat.

By the time she turned three, Thalia began taking it upon herself to advise her father how to improve his own coloring. 

She would toddle to his chair and tug on his clothes until he helped her clamber up into his lap. For a while, she usually sat silently, just watching Kylo sketching. It was a peaceful scene Rey loved to observe – Kylo focused and thoughtful as he penciled out design concepts, with Thalia’s mesmerized little face between his arms, watching his ideas take shape on the paper. Whenever he sat back for a moment to consider, he would often absent-mindedly ruffle Thalia’s hair. 

After sitting and watching for a while in silence, Thalia often thought she should help. Once, as Rey approached the studio to fetch Thalia for her bedtime, she heard Kylo speaking to their daughter, “Something’s missing from this one, but I can’t quite figure out what it is.”

Rey stepped into the doorway in time to see Thalia sit up in Kylo’s lap, waving a little fist in the air that came dangerously close to knocking Kylo in the face. He leaned back with a laugh. 

“I can fix it!” she proclaimed. 

Standing up on Kylo’s thighs, she reached across the table for her own set of colored pencils. Kylo was constantly getting her new sets, each with brighter and more variations of colors. Kylo had to steady her so she didn’t tumble to the floor as she searched for the exact color she had in mind. When she found it, she brandished it confidently. 

“Make it pink!” 

Rey realized immediately what the little girl had in mind, and found herself instinctively stepping into the room in alarm. Kylo’s sketches were hardly just a fanciful hobby. He spent days making each one meticulously perfect, since they’d eventually become the template for clothing pieces that would be produced and sold across multiple star systems. They each had to be proportioned and measured to the millimeter.

But, to Rey’s surprise, Kylo didn’t move a muscle in hindrance when Thalia bent over his sketch and began scribbling across it with her pink pencil. He just watched serenely as his daughter concentrated on covering the entire drawing in pink.

“Better!” Thalia proclaimed, beaming proudly when she finished. 

Kylo nodded, smiling to himself in amusement. “I don’t know why I didn’t think of that. It’s perfect now.”

That was when Rey finally came into the room. Thalia immediately protested, “No bedtime! I’m helping Daddy!”

“You’ve helped so much already, Thalia. I’m almost done now, thanks to you.”

Still, Thalia pouted as Rey lifted her out of Kylo’s lap and held her against her hip. 

Rey gave the scribbled-over drawing a covertly apprehensive look. “Will you… uh, have to finish that one?”

“A few… final touches is all. But she’s actually given me a new idea for a few different pieces…” Already, he started rifling through papers on his desk and drawing fresh ones towards him. “I’ll come to bed in a little while, okay?”

Rey nodded, briefly carding her free hand through Kylo’s hair. “I’ll get this little one to bed in the meantime.”

“No bedtime!” Thalia protested again as Rey carried her out. 

“Daddy might need your help again tomorrow, sweet pea,” Rey’s voice traveled back into the studio as she moved down the hall towards Thalia’s nursery. “Little designers in training need their rest to get their best ideas.”

Smiling to himself, Kylo picked up his daughter’s pink pencil and spun it between his fingers experimentally. He spread the blank pages out before him and lowered the pencil point towards them. 

 

Kylo came into the bedroom an hour later with papers in his hands. Immediately noticing Rey’s look of disapproval, he was quick to clarify, “I’m not bringing work in, I just want to show you…” He held up the papers. “I think Thalia just gave me the concept for my next major line.”

He held out the top page to Rey’s scrutiny. It took Rey a moment simply to process the fact that the sketch had been completed entirely in pink. Once her mind adjusted to a color scheme that wasn’t black monochromatic, she read the lettering across the top of the page: “Make It Pink.”

At first glance, the sketch appeared to be a cross between an infant’s onesie and a baby girl’s dress. As Rey studied the drawing, she noticed the billowing folds of a wide skirt that could wrap up the baby much like a blanket, complemented with smoothly fitted lines around the torso and folded sleeves that lent the entire piece the elegant suggestion of a gown. 

Rey looked up at him with a quirked smile, eyebrows raised.

“A baby dress?”

Kylo nodded seriously. “Infant designer pieces. No one’s done it before. It’s a brand new market.”

Rey stared at him for a long time. Long enough that his excitement over the idea ebbed slightly towards uncertainty.

“What are you thinking?” he finally asked.

Rey just shook her head, a smile growing on her face. She reached up from the bed to take the papers from Kylo’s hands, set them on the bedside table, then grab his hands and pull him down on the bed beside her. 

“I’m thinking about how much I love you.”

She crawled over him to kiss his lips. A moment later he was pulling her down to him, then rolling over atop her.

Then he didn’t think about clothes anymore for the rest of the night – Other than how badly he wanted Rey’s off of her. 

 

To Rey’s initial astonishment, Kylo seemed completely serious about rolling out a line of designer pieces for infants and toddlers. 

Naturally, their daughter’s closet had been overflowing with elaborate princess and fairy dresses ever since she’d started wearing proper clothes. Rey supposed Kylo had become quite the expert by now on little girl’s clothing – incredulous as the idea might have once seemed.

But there was simply nothing like the doting smile on Kylo’s face whenever he presented Thalia with a new dress. 

“Does this one have wings like I wanted, Daddy?”

Kylo nodded, turning the fabric over in her hands so she could see where he’d affixed small wings stitched from stiff, shimmering fabric. Thalia had shrieked in excitement and immediately run to Rey, tugging on her mother’s shirt. 

“Help me change, Mama!”

Rey supposed Kylo was right that it was a heretofore-unexplored market sector, and he had certainly developed the requisite expertise. 

After first bringing up the idea to Rey, Thalia became Kylo’s trusted consultant in the endeavor. 

“No no, make this one pink too,” she declared with her nose wrinkled, when Kylo showed her a drawing of a dress in tones of orange and yellow.

“Really?” he echoed, re-evaluating the drawing. She nodded seriously. 

Next, she became his quintessential model – Thrilled to try on any experimental versions of his ideas as he worked through them.

“Can I wear it?” she asked, her eyes sparkling in wonder when she toddled into Kylo’s home studio one evening and laid eyes on the sparkling silver dress he’d been working on. 

“Of course. I need my little assistant’s opinion.”

Rey nearly had to squint when Kylo carried Thalia into the kitchen a while later, after he’d finished the dress and helped Thalia into it. The sparkling fabric caught light at every conceivable angle.

“Too much?” Kylo asked, his own face scrunched against the glare. 

“Absolutely too much,” Rey agreed with a laugh. 

She came over to inspect the fabric, making Thalia giggle when Rey tickled under her chin. 

“Maybe intersperse some plain black fabric as a base? Black will absorb some of the light instead of reflecting it all,” Rey suggested. 

Kylo nodded quickly. “Good idea. I’ll go adjust it now.”

“But I like sparkling!” Thalia objected, crossing her arms. Rey grinned and leaned close to kiss the little girl’s forehead. 

“Don’t worry, honey, you always sparkle.”

Without doubt, one of the most memorable meetings during Rey’s entire career with the First Order was when Kylo convened the regional overseers for each star system and explained the concept to them. 

Rey had to hide her grin behind her hand, looking between where Kylo stood at the head of the table animatedly explaining the entire concept with the title “Make It Pink” projected behind him in unapologetically bright letters; While all the regional overseers listened with their mouths slightly agape. When Kylo concluded, they didn’t seem sure whether or not the whole thing was a joke.

“Sir…,” one of them began with fearful uncertainty, “You’re serious?”

Kylo just stared at the man for a long moment, his shoulders straight and unmoving. 

“Entirely.”

Kylo looked around the room slowly, taking in the disbelieving expressions. Dimly, he remembered that his staff hadn’t spent the last three years coming home to a joyous bundle of pure inspiration. 

“Entirely serious,” Kylo elaborated, though letting his voice lapse into a slightly gentler tone. Rey looked up from her note taking. “Making clothes for my daughter has made me realize there are whole frontiers of design possibilities yet unexplored. And I can assure you - The joy a little girl gets from a well-made dress in pink and preferably with sparkles? Other parents will want to experience that.”

He shifted his stance to briefly meet Rey’s gaze. She’d dropped the hand that had been covering her mouth; Now she smiled at him in fond, undisguised affirmation. 

“‘Make It Pink’…,” one of the regional overseers repeated to himself thoughtfully. He leaned forward in his seat. “It will be bold and attention-grabbing, simply coming from you, Sir. It will be such a break in your cultivated style.”

“But one that could pay off,” another one commented. “It will certainly be trailblazing.” 

 

Six months later, the ‘Make It Pink’ line celebrated its launch. After long discussions, Kylo and Rey had finally agreed the launch event on Coruscant would be Thalia’s first “official” public appearance. Press had been absolutely desperate for photos of her since her birth, but for three years Rey and Kylo had managed to keep her sheltered from the press spotlight. But considering that she’d been the chief inspiration for the entire undertaking, they thought the appropriate time had finally come. 

Moreover, for the whole idea of a baby and family-oriented fashion line to be taken seriously, Kylo knew there could be no statement more effective or authentic than a red carpet appearance by his own family. The ‘Make It Pink’ line had started here, named from his own daughter’s words and inspired by her coloring experiments. Its inspiration had come from the most private and treasured area of his life. Although the sentiments guiding it were too dear to ever be exploited, he thought it an acceptable concession to simply acknowledge their origin publically.

“You know what this reminds me of?” Rey asked, Thalia on her lap as their enclosed hovercraft pulled up to the red carpet leading into the event hall. 

After a moment of difficulty, Kylo pulled his anxious gaze away from the two rows of eager photographers and aggressive reporters lining the carpet, swiveling towards Rey instead. She was a much sweeter, calming sight. 

Thalia was sitting quietly in Rey’s arms, sucking a thumb. Her other hand held on to the shoulder of Rey’s gown, as if sensing the charged atmosphere around her and burrowing a little closer to her mother to compensate. 

“What?” Kylo asked softly, sliding a little closer to Rey on the seat – Seeking silent comfort from her presence just like his daughter. 

Rey lifted a hand to stroke the side of his face. 

“Coruscant Fashion Week. When you asked me to be your wife.”

Kylo breathed out slowly, full of wondrous warm remembrance. It felt like ages of time had passed since then, and then none at all. Without fail, he could always recall the breathless wave of understanding that had stolen over him that night, when Rey affirmed aloud what he’d never dared to expect, even through secret moments of overwhelming longing – That she felt as he did; Remaining with him always had become the single guiding purpose for all she did. 

Even in this moment, years later, he still heard her voice in his head: _“I only ever did this job for you, so you would be happier.” … “Yes. I will marry you. I will.”_

He still saw her perfectly, to the detail. Standing before him, silhouetted by the city nightlights from the wide window, her features painted with relief and joy when he finally found the courage to speak all the frightening, immense things he felt for her that could each have had the power to destroy him, should she have turned them away. 

For a priceless diamond of a moment, his thoughts overflowed with all they had shared since then. Every day that she was his, every day he called her wife and woke up beside her, she grew still more lovely and all consuming. He felt small and grateful before her luminescence, even while all she inspired in him made him indomitable and all capable.

He turned his head to press a light kiss to her fingers, then reached up to capture her slim fingers between his longer ones. He traced the graceful line of her wedding ring with his thumb as his eyes met hers. 

“I was terrified that night,” Kylo confessed in a whisper. “Not by the crowds or the reporters, but the thought that you might leave someday and I wouldn’t be able to stop you. Ironically, that was all that gave me the courage to ask.”

Rey shook her head minutely, smiling at Kylo in fond disbelief. “You were afraid for nothing. Though in retrospect, I suppose I should be grateful that it finally made you tell me how you felt.”

“All that time, I’d thought it was so painfully obvious to you,” Kylo said wryly. “That ever since I met you, the only thing that mattered to me was making you happy – Being a man you would be proud of.”

Over Thalia’s oblivious head, Rey stretched up to kiss her husband slowly and deeply. He was her partner, her friend, her lover, her support, her protection against the lonely austerity that had been her only companion for so long. Of course, he had occasionally been her biggest challenge as well, but those moments had only helped her grow into someone who pursued and protected what she wanted because it was her own choice. He always looked at her as if she were as immovable as the stars, as mighty as the sun – but it had taken her a long time to internalize all that he revered in her. 

“I am so proud of you, Kylo,” she whispered, letting her nose gently bump his as she lingered in the caress of his warm breath and his gentle fingertips at her cheek. “I promise there isn’t a woman in the whole galaxy whose husband could possibly make her any happier.”

Rey pulled back only enough to cast a warm look to their daughter between them, still contently sucking her thumb. 

“Who could have imagined we’d end up here?” she asked softly. 

“I could,” Kylo replied, his fingers still curled to hers. “With you, I can imagine every happiness.”

He leaned in to give her one last kiss in the sacred quiet of the transport. 

That was when Thalia began wriggling in Rey’s hold. “Let’s say hi to the people!”

Rey pulled back from Kylo’s lips, chuckling. She smoothed her daughter’s hair, making sure her little dress was in place. 

“I think she was born to be your poster child,” Rey said fondly.

“Oh no,” Kylo said, sitting up slightly as he fixed his tie and pulled the sleeves of his suit jacket straight. “She was born for a lot more than that.”

~

Pictures from the red carpet launch event of Supreme Designer Kylo Ren’s newest fashion line were soon plastered across every major media source in the galaxy. The footage played on repeat on nearly every broadcast frequency.

Kylo stepped out of the transport first. He combed a hand through his hair and gave an acknowledging nod towards the clamoring press crowds. The set of his mouth was flat and serious. 

Then he reached back with one open hand. Rey placed her hand in his to steady herself as she stepped onto the carpet beside him, their little girl propped in her other arm. Once the transport pulled away behind them, Rey shifted Thalia to hold her in both arms, while Kylo’s arm rested around his wife’s waist. 

They embodied the entire spirit of Kylo’s new clothing line, in both the figurative and literal sense. Rey was dressed in a floor-length gown of soft, floral pink that fluttered elegantly with each step. In her arms, little Thalia wore the centerpiece of the entire collection. Kylo had adapted the piece from one of the first play dresses he’d ever made for her. The fabric was the brightest shade of pink shy of neon – Bright enough to complement Thalia’s rosy cheeks without crossing the line of washout. Subtle orange accents woven through the billowing folds of the skirt eased the sharpness of the color, while creamy white accents made subtle patterns in the loose bodice. Beside Rey, Kylo stood tall and striking in a new variation of his trademark black suit, completed by a pale pink tie tucked into his waistcoat, matching the exact shade of Rey’s gown. 

As they advanced slowly along the red carpet, Thalia spent the first minute staring around at all the flashing lights and clamoring people. Kylo and Rey both watched her carefully, but she didn’t quite react at first – Just blinked wide eyes and looked around with her mouth hanging open slightly. 

Rey kept lightly bouncing her a little, leaning in now and then to murmur something to the girl too soft for cameras to capture.

Then, halfway down, Thalia seemed to get it. The crowds were loud, but she was safe with her parents. In fact, all the noise seemed to be for them…

The little girl reached up to grab onto her mother’s shoulder, so she could pull herself up a bit higher. Then she lifted her other hand in an excited wave over her head. 

“Hi people!”

After that, most cameras zoomed in on the excited, grinning little girl who seemed to just soak up the attention. 

Over the years, hundreds and hundreds of models had exhibited Supreme Designer Kylo Ren’s clothing lines. With a single smile and wave, his three-year-old daughter became the most beloved and iconic of them all. 

When a camera panned across to the Supreme Designer, it found him with a relaxed, reflexive smile the likes of which cameras had never found on his face before. 

In the single interview they allowed at the carpet’s end, Kylo fielded a few questions about marketing plans for the new line and projected availability of the new pieces. Just before the reporters let him and his family pass into the exhibition hall, one called out, “Supreme Designer! Can we ask your daughter a question?”

Kylo blinked, thrown for a moment. He turned to look towards Rey, who shrugged and nodded slightly. 

“Fine.”

As one, the reporters quieted down as to avoid overwhelming the little girl. 

“Thalia, he’s going to ask you a question, okay?” Rey said to her daughter, who looked up curiously. The reporter with the question leaned forward so he wouldn’t have to shout. 

“You look so pretty in your dress, Thalia. Do you like wearing it?”

Thalia stared at the reporter for a long second. Then she said very clearly, “Duh. Daddy made it just for me! But you’d look pretty in it too.”

Rey, Kylo, and the entire press section burst into laughter. Cameras exploded to life again, capturing the family one more time.

“Thank you, Thalia!” The reporter called to her over the din. 

Seeing how Kylo was smiling at her, Thalia held her arms out towards him. Rey handed her to him, and cameras flashed again as he settled her in one arm and she started fiddling with his tie. He didn’t admonish her, just let her pull the tie knot slightly crooked as he wrapped his free arm around his wife on his other side. Rey stepped close to him and they stood for a few more moments awash in flashbulbs. 

Finally, the couple nodded goodbyes and turned to make their way into the hall. Over Kylo’s shoulder, Thalia waved the whole way.


End file.
